Integrating multiple criteria decision analysis in participatory forest planning

Forest planning in a participatory context often involves multiple stakeholders with conflicting interests. A promising approach for handling these complex situations is to integrate participatory planning and multiple criteria decision analysis (MCDA). The objective of this paper is to analyze strengths and weaknesses of such an integrated approach, focusing on how the use of MCDA has influenced the participatory process. The paper outlines a model for a participatory MCDA process with five steps: stakeholder analysis, structuring of the decision problem, generation of alternatives, elicitation of preferences, and ranking of alternatives. This model was applied in a case study of a planning process for the urban forest in Lycksele, Sweden. In interviews with stakeholders, criteria for four different social groups were identified. Stakeholders also identified specific areas important to them and explained what activities the areas were used for and the forest management they wished for there. Existing forest data were combined with information from interviews to create a map in which the urban forest was divided into zones of different management classes. Three alternative strategic forest plans were produced based on the zonal map. The stakeholders stated their preferences individually by the Analytic Hierarchy Process in inquiry forms and a ranking of alternatives and consistency ratios were determined for each stakeholder. Rankings of alternatives were aggregated; first, for each social group using the arithmetic mean, and then an overall aggregated ranking was calculated from the group rankings using the weighted arithmetic mean. The participatory MCDA process in Lycksele is assessed against five social goals: incorporating public values into decisions, improving the substantive quality of decisions, resolving conflict among competing interests, building trust in institutions, and educating and informing the public. The results and assessment of the case study support the integration of participatory planning and MCDA as a viable option for handling complex forest-management situations. Key issues related to the MCDA methodology that need to be explored further were identified: 1) The handling of place-specific criteria, 2) development of alternatives, 3) the aggregation of individual preferences into a common preference, and 4) application and evaluation of the integrated approach in real case studies

Determinants of Parental Leave Uptake among Fathers: A Comparative Study of Four Nordic Countries

Fathers in the Nordic countries were among the first in the world to gain the right to paid parental leave. The overall uptake has however been low, despite various attempts to increase it. This paper compares characteristics of fathers in four Nordic countries, to identify important determinants of parental leave uptake. The relationships were tested using logistic regression models. Support for theories regarding household division of labor and household bargaining was found: the socioeconomic position of the father, but also the spouse was positively correlated with the probability of parental leave uptake of the father

Teachers’ perceptions of social support in the co-planning of multidisciplinary technology education

In Finland, technology education is a multidisciplinary field where team teaching serves as a basis for the integration of technology across different school subjects. However, Finnish teacher education does not adequately prepare the student teachers for multidisciplinary technology education, and the professional competency is often gained through voluntary participation in professional development courses. The resulting individual differences in teachers’ technology education competency hinder their ability to plan such educational offerings together. While previous studies have identified multidisciplinary team teaching as a way of balancing out individual differences in teachers’ professional competency, the ability to leverage it depends on the availability of social support. Previous studies have examined the effect of social support in teachers’ professional well-being, but further research on its role in organising multidisciplinary technology education is needed. This study explores what kind of social support is involved in the co-planning of multidisciplinary technology education. Eleven experienced in-service teachers representing different school subjects participated in interviews carried out in 2019–2020. The data were analysed by applying the principles of qualitative content analysis. The findings revealed that instrumental support in the form of new ideas, tools, and methods was emphasised in the teachers’ experiences. The perceived needs for more social support were mainly related to making joint decisions during the co-planning process. The findings indicate that co-planning in multidisciplinary teams increases the versatility of possible implementations of technology education. However, leveraging multidisciplinary team teaching would require more support for pedagogical leadership.Peer reviewe

Decision support systems in forest management: requirements from a participatory planning perspective

Participatory approaches and computerised tools such as decision support systems (DSS) represent conflicting tendencies in state-of the-art sustainable forest management. As a result, there may be considerable tension between these two developments in practice. The objective of this paper is to explore how participatory approaches and DSS could be brought together to improve planning processes and to explore how DSS could be adapted in their use or combined with other tools to enable successful participatory planning. From a review of the literature, we identified criteria related to successful participatory planning. From these criteria, we selected those a DSS can influence and created a short list of the criteria that could be used to evaluate participatory processes where DSS are applied. The evaluation criteria with particular relevance for DSS that we identified are as follows: fairness, opportunity to influence outcome, quality and selection of information, cost-effectiveness, challenging status quo and fostering creative thinking, structured decision-making process, transparency, and independence and neutrality of process. We also scrutinised existing forest DSS and identified features that may enable DSS to address these criteria. The features of DSS we identified that may support participatory processes are as follows: group decision support, possibilities to include other values than timber production, flexibility of system to include non-traditional forest data and management options, and multi-criteria decision analysis tools. We argue that the DSS to be used should be assessed to clarify, how it can be used in the specific planning situation and how it should be complemented with other available and non-computerised tool

Investigating the emotion regulation strategies implemented by adults grieving the death of a pet in Australia and the UK

Pet-related grief has been for the most part been overlooked in psychological research. The aim of this study was twofold. First, to investigate whether the ambiguous loss of one’s pet was associated with heightened grief compared to certain pet death; and second, to examine whether adaptive emotion regulation (ER) strategies were related to less pet grief reactions compared to maladaptive ER strategies. One hundred and thirty-four bereaved individuals recruited from the UK and Australia completed an online survey. Within the Australian sample no significant difference in grief severity emerged between individuals who had experienced ambiguous pet loss (N = 10) vs. certain death (N = 65). For the second aim, based on 67 Australian and 56 UK participants who had experienced the death of their pet, maladaptive ER strategies including catastrophizing were positively associated with heightened grief, anger and trauma symptoms following pet death, while more ‘adaptive’ ER strategies were significantly associated with less grief, anger, trauma and guilt symptoms. The findings have clinical implications for individuals recovering from the death of their pet

Basic psychological need satisfaction and frustration in major depressive disorder

Basic psychological needs theory postulates that a social environment that satisfies individuals’ three basic psychological needs of autonomy, competence, and relatedness leads to optimal growth and well-being. On the other hand, the frustration of these needs is associated with ill-being and depressive symptoms foremost investigated in non-clinical samples; yet, there is a paucity of research on need frustration in clinical samples. Survey data were compared between adult individuals with major depressive disorder (MDD; n = 115; 48.69% female; 38.46 years, SD = 10.46) with those of a non-depressed comparison sample (n = 201; 53.23% female; 30.16 years, SD = 12.81). Need profiles were examined with a linear mixed model (LMM). Individuals with depression reported higher levels of frustration and lower levels of satisfaction in relation to the three basic psychological needs when compared to non-depressed adults. The difference between depressed and non-depressed groups was significantly larger for frustration than satisfaction regarding the needs for relatedness and competence. LMM correlation parameters confirmed the expected positive correlation between the three needs. This is the first study showing substantial differences in need-based experiences between depressed and non-depressed adults. The results confirm basic assumptions of the self-determination theory and have preliminary implications in tailoring therapy for depression

Integrating wind disturbances into forest planning: a stochastic programming approach

Forest disturbances challenge our ability to carefully plan for sustainable use of forest resources. As forest disturbances are stochastic, we cannot plan for the disturbance at any specific time or location. However, we can prepare for the possibility of a disturbance by integrating its potential intensity range and frequency when developing forest management plans. This study uses stochastic programming to integrate wind intensity (wind speed) and wind event frequency (number of occurrences) into the forest planning process on a small coastal Finnish forest landscape. We used a mechanistic model to quantify the critical wind speed for tree felling, with a Monte Carlo approach to include wind damage and salvage logging into forest management alternatives. We apply a stochastic programming model to explore two objectives: maximizing the expected forest net present value or maximizing the even-flow of income. To assess the effects of improper wind risk assumptions in planning, we compare the results when optimizing for correct versus incorrect wind intensity and frequency assumptions. When maximizing for net present value, the impacts of misidentifying wind intensity and frequency are minor, likely due to harvests planned immediately as trees reach maturity. For the case when maximizing even-flow of income, incorrectly identifying wind intensity and frequency severely impacts the ability to meet the required harvest targets and reduces the expected net present value. The specific utility of risk mitigation therefore depends on the planning problem. Overall, we show that incorporating wind disturbances into forest planning can inform forest owners about how they can manage wind risk based on their specific risk preferences

3D printing high-consistency enzymatic nanocellulose obtained from a soda-ethanol-O2 pine sawdust pulp

Soda-ethanol pulps, prepared from a forestry residue pine sawdust, were treated according to high-consistency enzymatic fibrillation technology to manufacture nanocellulose. The obtained nanocellulose was characterized and used as ink for three-dimensional (3D) printing of various structures. It was also tested for its moisture sorption capacity and cytotoxicity, as preliminary tests for evaluating its suitability for wound dressing and similar applications. During the high-consistency enzymatic treatment it was found that only the treatment of the O2-delignified pine pulp resulted in fibrillation into nano-scale. For 3D printing trials, the material needed to be fluidized further. By 3D printing, it was possible to fabricate various structures from the high-consistency enzymatic nanocellulose. However, the water sorption capacity of the structures was lower than previously seen with porous nanocellulose structures, indicating that further optimization of the material is needed. The material was found not to be cytotoxic, thus showing potential as material, e.g., for wound dressings and for printing tissue models.Fil: Kangas, Heli. Technical Research Centre; FinlandiaFil: Felissia, Fernando Esteban. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - Nordeste. Instituto de Materiales de Misiones. Universidad Nacional de Misiones. Facultad de Ciencias Exactas Químicas y Naturales. Instituto de Materiales de Misiones; ArgentinaFil: Filgueira, Daniel. No especifíca;Fil: Ehman, Nanci Vanesa. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - Nordeste. Instituto de Materiales de Misiones. Universidad Nacional de Misiones. Facultad de Ciencias Exactas Químicas y Naturales. Instituto de Materiales de Misiones; ArgentinaFil: Vallejos, María Evangelina. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - Nordeste. Instituto de Materiales de Misiones. Universidad Nacional de Misiones. Facultad de Ciencias Exactas Químicas y Naturales. Instituto de Materiales de Misiones; ArgentinaFil: Imlauer Vedoya, Camila María. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - Nordeste. Instituto de Materiales de Misiones. Universidad Nacional de Misiones. Facultad de Ciencias Exactas Químicas y Naturales. Instituto de Materiales de Misiones; ArgentinaFil: Lahtinen, Panu. Technical Research Centre; FinlandiaFil: Area, Maria Cristina. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - Nordeste. Instituto de Materiales de Misiones. Universidad Nacional de Misiones. Facultad de Ciencias Exactas Químicas y Naturales. Instituto de Materiales de Misiones; ArgentinaFil: Chinga Carrasco, Gary. No especifíca

Reducing cannabinoid abuse and preventing relapse by enhancing endogenous brain levels of kynurenic acid

In the reward circuitry of the brain, alpha-7-nicotinic acetylcholine receptors (α7nAChRs) modulate effects of delta-9-tetrahydrocannabinol (THC), marijuana’s main psychoactive ingredient. Kynurenic acid (KYNA) is an endogenous negative allosteric modulator of α7nAChRs. Here we report that the kynurenine 3-monooxygenase (KMO) inhibitor Ro 61-8048 increases brain KYNA levels and attenuates cannabinoid-induced increases in extracellular dopamine in reward-related brain areas. In the self-administration model of drug abuse, Ro 61-8048 reduced the rewarding effects of THC and the synthetic cannabinoid WIN 55,212-2 in squirrel monkeys and rats, respectively, and it also prevented relapse to drug-seeking induced by re-exposure to cannabinoids or cannabinoid-associated cues. The effects of enhancing endogenous KYNA levels with Ro 61-8048 were prevented by positive allosteric modulators of α7nAChRs. Despite a clear need, there are currently no medications approved for treatment of marijuana dependence. Modulation of KYNA provides a novel pharmacological strategy for achieving abstinence from marijuana and preventing relapse