Adaptive voting: an empirical analysis of participation and choice

Dynamic models of learning and adaptation have provided realistic predictions in terms of voting behavior. This study aims at contributing to their empirical verification by investigating voting behavior in terms of participation as well as choice. We test through panel data methods an outcome-based learning mechanism based on the following assumptions: (a) people expect that the party they do not support will be unable to bring economic improvements; (b) they receive a feedback whose impact depends on the consistency between their last voting behavior and personal economic improvements (or worsening) from the last election; (c) they tend to discard choices associated to an inconsistent feedback. Results show that feedbacks of this sort affect persistence of voting behavior, interpreted as participation and voting choice. Age and trade union affiliation reinforce this adaptive behavior. The analysis also investigates the intensity of the learning feedback, differentiating between a strong inconsistent feedback, which leads to a vote switch in favor of the opponent party, and a weak inconsistent feedback, which induces just abstention rather than a vote switch.voting, bounded rationality, learning, political accountability

The collapse of the Morandi bridge in Genoa on 14 august 2018: A collective traumatic event and its emotional impact linked to the place and loss of a symbol

The collapse of the Morandi bridge in Italy, which took place in the summer of 2018, has had enormous emotional, economic, and social consequences for the inhabitants of the area, which are felt throughout the world. As seen in the literature, collective traumatic events increase the experience of insecurity and paranoia, thus increasing the perception of vulnerability. The present work aims to bring out the emotions most experienced by the participants connected to the traumatic event in question, paying attention to the possible solutions to be proposed to local stakeholders from a sustainability perspective, this way favouring community empowerment. The research, carried out with the photovoice technique, involved 30 young adults residing in areas near the event. The results illustrate how the participants experienced mainly feelings of emptiness, vulnerability, and fear as well as anger, despair, and mistrust of the institutions. It was also stressed that the economic and structural hardships hit the inhabitants hard. There have been many concrete solutions identified by the participants: creating a support network, supporting the local economy, and keeping the memory alive. The research and application implications underline the importance of using photovoice within community interventions, a tool that facilitates awareness and active citizenship

HYDROCARBONS REMOVAL FROM BILGE WATER BY ADSORPTION ONTO ACTIVATED BIOCHAR FROM POSIDONIA OCEANICA

The normal operations carried out on the boats during navigation generate waste waters such as oily bilge water. The latter is the aqueous mixture of potential pollutants of different origins and types: oily fluids, lubricants and greases, cleaning fluids and other wastes that accumulate in the lower part of the vessel [1,2]. The current legislation provides that they can be discharge directly into the sea if the concentrations of some components are below the expected limits. In particular, with regard to oil / hydrocarbons contamination, the current regulatory limit is 15 mg L-1 of total hydrocarbons. The present work starts from a public/private partnership funded by a grant of the Ministry of Economic Development (MiSE). Among the aims of the project, novel methods shall be tested for the reduction of hydrocarbons concentration at values below 5 mg L-1. Moreover, instrumental techniques able to quickly measure the required low hydrocarbons concentration were tested. Among the different steps of bilge water treatment in pilot plant (coagulation, flotation, centrifugation, adsorption etc.), the latter requires the use of adsorbent materials able to reduce the oily concentration below the legal limits. Here we have hosen, optimized and tested materials obtained from bio-oil production waste, a biochar obtained by pyrolysis of Posidonia oceanica, a marine plant widespread in the Mediterranean sea. means of acid or alkali treatments. Moreover, a commercial activated carbon (Filtrasorb 400) has been used for comparison purpose. Synthetic bilge waters were prepared following the reference standards [3] for the preparation of test fluids (used to test the bilge separator plant), containing DMA (distillate marine fuel) and SLS (sodium lauryl sulfate). Batch adsorption isotherms were carried out without ionic medium and at different ionic strengths in NaCl in order to evaluate the effect of salinity on the adsorption ability of dsorbent materials. The same adsorbents were tested by column experiments. In particular, a bench pilot system was built (Figure 1.) and breakthrough curves were obtained changing amount of adsorbent material in column, flow rate, initial DMA and surfactant concentrations. Several instrumental techniques (turbidimetry, TOC, HPLC-QQQ and HPLC-FLD) have been used to measure surfactant and hydrocarbon concentrations in experimental samples. The batch experimental data were fitted with the most used isotherm models (Langmuir, Freundlich, Sips) and important considerations were made on the breakthrough curves of column experiments

Long-Term Stability of TiS2–Alkylamine Hybrid Materials

Layered TiS2 intercalated with linear alkylamines has recently attracted significant interest as a model compound for flexible n-type thermoelectric applications, showing remarkably high power factors at room temperature. The thermal and, particularly, environmental stability of such materials is, however, a still an open challenge. In this paper, we show that amine-intercalated TiS2 prepared by a simple mechanochemical process is prone to chemical decomposition through sulfur exsolution, and that the presence of molecular oxygen is likely to mediate the decomposition reaction. Through computational analysis of the possible reaction pathways, we propose that Ti-N adducts are formed as a consequence of amine groups substituting for S vacancies on the internal surfaces of the S-Ti-S layers. These findings provide insights for possible future applications of similar hybrid compounds as devices operating in ambient conditions, and suggest isolating them from atmospheric oxygen

Modelling the structural disorder in trigonal-prismatic coordinated transition metal dichalcogenides

Trigonal-prismatic coordinated transition metal dichalcogenides (TMDCs) are formed from stacked (chalcogen)-(transition metal)-(chalcogen) triple layers, where the chemical bond is covalent within the triple layers and van der Waals (vdW) forces are effective between the layers. Bonding is at the origin of the great interest in these compounds, which are used as 2D materials in applications such as catalysis, electronics, photoelectronics, sensors, batteries and thermoelectricity. This paper addresses the issue of modelling the structural disorder in multilayer TMDCs. The structural model takes into account stacking faults, correlated displacement of atoms and average crystallite size/shape, and is assessed by simulation of the X-ray diffraction pattern and fitting to the experimental data relative to a powdered sample of MoS2 exfoliated and restacked via lithiation. From fitting, an average crystallite size of about 50 angstrom, nearly spherical crystallites and a definite probability of deviation from the fully eclipsed atomic arrangement present in the ordered structure are determined. The increased interlayer distance and correlated intralayer and interlayer atomic displacement are attributed to the presence of lithium intercalated in the vdW gap between triple layers (Li/Mo molar ratio of about 0.06). The model holds for the whole class of trigonal-prismatic coordinated TMDCs, and is suitably flexible to take into account different preparation routes

Debonding of adhesive joints by means of microwave and induction heating processes

In this work, an innovative technique for adhesive joint separation that combines the use of a hybrid-modified adhesive with microwave (MW) or induction heating (IH) [1-3] processes is presented. Graphene nanoplatelets (GnPs) and iron oxide particles were used to modify a thermoplastic adhesive, polyolefin hot-melt adhesive by mean of a twin-screw extruder. This thermoplastic adhesive, already used for bonding automotive applications, was modified with both iron oxide and GnPs in order to enhance the electrical properties and the sensitivity to MW and IH. The mechanical and electrical properties together with the sensitivity of the modified adhesives to microwave or induction heating processes are investigated. Single Lap Joint (SLJ) specimens were used to evaluate the mechanical properties of the pristine and the modified adhesive. The mechanical tests illustrate that the maximum loads of modified adhesives decrease slightly. Tests conducted with microwave and induction heating processes showed that these two systems are able to melt the modified adhesive. Thus, the separation of bonded joints is possible with both systems. The temperature increase of the induction heating system is found to be more rapid than the microwaves but the latter system is energetically more efficient. Scanning Electron Microscope (SEM) was used to measure the particle distribution and to evaluate the differences between the manual mixed mode and the tween extruder system as preliminary analysis

Adaptive voting: an empirical analysis of participation and choice

Dynamic models of learning and adaptation have provided realistic predictions in terms of voting behavior. This study aims at contributing to their empirical verification by investigating voting behavior in terms of participation as well as choice. We test through panel data methods an outcome-based learning mechanism based on the following assumptions: (a) people expect that the party they do not support will be unable to bring economic improvements; (b) they receive a feedback whose impact depends on the consistency between their last voting behavior and personal economic improvements (or worsening) from the last election; (c) they tend to discard choices associated to an inconsistent feedback. Results show that feedbacks of this sort affect persistence of voting behavior, interpreted as participation and voting choice. Age and trade union affiliation reinforce this adaptive behavior. The analysis also investigates the intensity of the learning feedback, differentiating between a strong inconsistent feedback, which leads to a vote switch in favor of the opponent party, and a weak inconsistent feedback, which induces just abstention rather than a vote switch

Solid-state compatibility of Ca:LaNbO4 with perovskite cathodes: Evidences from X-ray microspectroscopy

The solid-state compatibility between calcium-doped lanthanum niobate and three perovskite cathode materials was investigated using two X-ray microbeam techniques, micro X-ray fluorescence and micro X-ray absorption spectroscopy. The cathode powders (lanthanum strontium ferrite, either cobalt or copper-doped, and lanthanum strontium cobaltite) in contact with the dense electrolyte pellet were annealed at 1150°C for 12–144 h to simulate the effect of thermal stresses due to fabrication and long-term operation. As a result, several interdiffusion phenomena were then observed on the bilayer cross-sections: in particular, the chemical state and coordination environment of calcium, iron, niobium and lanthanum were probed with space-resolved X-ray absorption spectroscopy. The ab initio modeling of the near-edge X-ray absorption spectra reveal that the cation interdiffusion is facilitated by the structural flexibility of the perovskite structure, which is able to accommodate a variety of foreign cations in different oxidation states. Limited stability at high-temperatures was found for all candidate perovskite compositions in contact with lanthanum niobate

Adaptive voting: an empirical analysis of participation and choice

Dynamic models of learning and adaptation have provided realistic predictions in terms of voting behavior. This study aims at contributing to their empirical verification by investigating voting behavior in terms of participation as well as choice. We test through panel data methods an outcome-based learning mechanism based on the following assumptions: (a) people expect that the party they do not support will be unable to bring economic improvements; (b) they receive a feedback whose impact depends on the consistency between their last voting behavior and personal economic improvements (or worsening) from the last election; (c) they tend to discard choices associated to an inconsistent feedback. Results show that feedbacks of this sort affect persistence of voting behavior, interpreted as participation and voting choice. Age and trade union affiliation reinforce this adaptive behavior. The analysis also investigates the intensity of the learning feedback, differentiating between a strong inconsistent feedback, which leads to a vote switch in favor of the opponent party, and a weak inconsistent feedback, which induces just abstention rather than a vote switch