Documentation for the spatial analysis system (SPAN) for resource use by animals

Nearest-neighbor analyses have been used with mapped data f or tests of spatial dispersion and association i n plant and animal ecology. This paper full describes a computer software package developed to use Monte Carlo trials instead of chi-squared distributions for assigning probabilities to observed values of nearest neighbor statistics. The program can factor-out the unique geometry of resources in a sample plot,which can affect locations of animals, thus testing for direct patterns among the animals independent of their resource patterns. The Kappa statistic for association is a1 o calculated a1though its application has met with limited success. A users manual and the Fortran program language is included. (80pp.

Rationality around the clock. Sleep and time-of-day effects on guessing game responses

We administer a unique online version of the Guessing Game where subject responses are collected across all 24 hours of the day. While time-of-day itself does not affect guesses, when combined with a trait-level sleepiness measure and previous night sleep, adverse sleep states lead to responses significantly farther from equilibrium. These results have implications for shift workers and others whose constraints or choices lead to adverse sleep parameters. Key Words:

Thoughtful Days and Valenced Nights: How Much Will You Think About the Problem?

Research investigating risk preference has pointed towards motivation and ability as important factors for determining the strength and likelihood of the framing effect. In the current study we explored the influence of individual differences in motivation and ability through circadian rhythm. We predicted that during circadian off-times participants would exhibit stronger framing effects whereas framing effects would be relatively weaker during on-times. Six-hundred and eighty five individuals took part in the study; the findings supported our hypothesis, revealing a diurnal pattern of risk responding that varies across the 24-hour circadian cycle. Key Words:

Naturally-occurring sleep choice and time of day effects on p-beauty contest outcomes

We explore the behavioral consequences of sleep loss and time-of-day (circadian) effects on a particular type of decision making. Subject sleep is monitored for the week prior to a decision experiment, which is then conducted at 8 a.m. or 8 p.m. A validated circadian preference instrument allows us to randomly assign subjects to a more or less preferred time-of-day session. The well-known p-beauty contest (a.k.a., the guessing game) is administered to examine how sleep loss and circadian mismatch affect subject reasoning and learning. We find that the subject responses are consistent with significantly lower levels of iterative reasoning when ‘sleep deprived’ or at non-optimal times-of-day. A non-linear effect is estimated to indicate that too much sleep also leads to choices consistent with lower levels of reasoning, with an apparent optimum at close to 7 hours sleep per night. However, repeated play shows that sleep loss and non-optimal times-of-day do not affect learning or adaptation in response to information feedback. Our results apply to environments where anticipation is important, such as in coordination games, stock trading, driving, etc. These findings have important implications for the millions of adults considered sleep deprived, as well as those employed in shift work occupations. Key Words:

Flying Airplanes: Realizing Circadian Effects (FARCE)

People differ in their diurnal (time-of-day) preferences—some are morning-types and others are evening-types. These differences are explored in a unique experiment design in which subjects are randomly assigned to produce paper airplanes at either 8:00 a.m. or 10:00 p.m. Our results show that evening-types at their more optimal time-of-day (10:00 p.m.) produce planes that fly statistically significantly farther than those produced by morning-types at their more optimal time-of-day (8:00 a.m.). Evidence also indicates that planes produced by evening-types fly straighter. These results have implications for hiring practices and shift work design in aeronautical engineering and aircraft production. Key Words:

Temporal contingencies associated with multiple anthropogenic disturbances in shallow marine assemblages

This thesis characterises the roles of indirect effects and temporal contingencies, which are events that have happened at some point in time and lead to one of many possible outcomes, on ecosystem level response to multiple potentially-interacting stressors. The assemblage response of a semi-natural marine food web to the interactive effects of warming, eutrophication and changing body size of a top predator was observed. The effects of minor nutrient enrichment are negligible and warming produces subtle responses, but the manipulation of top predator body size evokes a strong trophic cascade. This suggests that the long-term decreased body size effect of warming will be of greater ecological consequence than any short-term direct effects of higher temperature that may be experienced by individuals. The relative body size can explain much of the trophic interaction between predator and prey species. The absence of refugia down-shifts the size-structuring of the predator-prey relationship so that larger predators exert greater predation pressure on smaller prey. The effect of copper contamination on two successional stages of subtidal community assembly was examined. It was found that: (1) biofilms are sensitive to changes in copper concentration in the surrounding water column, irrespective of whether the changes involve exposure to or depuration from copper, and not just exposure to elevated copper concentrations per se and; (2) invertebrate assemblages respond to increased exposure to copper from the surrounding water column. This suggests that benthic invertebrate settlement is robust to the indirect effect of copper-induced changes in biofilm communities, but not to the direct toxic effect of copper itself. This work highlights the importance of temporal contingencies including legacy effects, ecological history and the coincidence of random events for identification of the mechanisms in community assembly

Sleep Restriction and Circadian Effects on Social Decisions

Our study examines how chronic sleep restriction and suboptimal times-of-day affect decisions in a classic set of social tasks. We experimentally manipulate and objectively measured sleep in 184 young-adult subjects, who were also randomly assigned an early morning or late evening experiment session during which decision tasks were administered. Sleep restriction and suboptimal time-of-day are both estimated to either directly or indirectly (via an impact on sleepiness) reduce altruism, trust, and trustworthiness. We conclude that commonly experienced adverse sleep states, most notably chronic sleep restriction, significantly reduce prosocial behaviors, and can therefore limit benefits from short-term social interactions

Open Research Survey Report 2017

Providing Research Data Management (RDM) support has many challenges. The different types of data, the volume storied on various media, the differences across disciplines, all contribute to the complexity of supporting RDM in a diverse institution such as Birkbeck. Another part of the challenge of delivering an RDM service is the varying attitudes toward data management. Staff are often unclear of what “Research Data” means to them, and have often have mixed levels of previous support or training. Without knowing what our academics already understand of RDM, it would be very hard to meet their needs in the correct way. Many institutions have run these types of surveys in the past few years, yielding useful results. Recently UCL, SOAS, and a consortium led by Jisc have run very similar surveys, which we hoped to be able to compare our results to. Open Access was also included in the survey; so as to compare attitudes to a previous survey which ran in 2011. Same questions were deliberately the same, while we added some extra questions about the Research Excellence Frame work to gauge current staff attitudes

Introduction: the Alabama Conference on Medieval & Renaissance Scottish Literature: Reframing and Mediation

Introduces the broader theme of the 16th International Conference on Medieval & Renaissance Scottish Language and Literature, held at the University of Alabama in 2021, and comments briefly on the four papers that follow