The perception of economic inequality in everyday life: My friends with the most and the least money

The study of perceived economic differences in everyday life is relevant to deepen the knowledge of how inequality shapes psychological processes. In the current research, Spanish undergraduates (N=547) were asked what their friends with the most and least money could do with their resources. Using a qualitative and quantitative approach, we performed a content analysis of the 1,085 open-ended responses given, ran latent class analyses with the coded material to identify groups of participants, and explored whether class membership was associated with their awareness of inequality and support for redistribution. Participants perceived inequality among their friends through daily indicators such as consumption, opportunities, leisure, and mental health; some participants used compensatory strategies to mitigate perceived inequality. Latent class analyses suggested that participants differed mostly in the attention paid to consumption and in the use of compensatory strategies. Exploratory analyses suggested that perceiving inequality in everyday life in terms of consumption, negative attributes towards the wealthy, or positive attributes towards low socioeconomic groups was related to acknowledging economic differences among individuals and support for redistribution. The study of perceived economic inequality in everyday life continues a new line of research with the potential to obtain results more consistent with people's experiences.OAICE-006-2017UCR::Sedes Regionales::Sede de Occident

Women in limnology: From a historical perspective to a present-day evaluation

Research in limnology is nurtured by the work of many fascinating and passionate women, who have contributed enormously to our understanding of inland waters. Female limnologists have promoted and established the bases of our knowledge about inland waters and fostered the need of protecting the values of those ecosystems. However, on numerous occasions, their contribution to the advancement of limnology has not been duly recognized. Here, we review the presence of women in limnology through the history of the discipline: from the pioneers who contributed to the origins to present day' developments. We aim at visibilizing those scientists and establish them as role models. We also analyze in a simple and illustrative way the current situation of women in limnology, the scientific barriers they must deal with, and their future prospects. Multiple aspects fostering the visibility of a scientist, such as their presence in conferences, awards, or representation in societal or editorial boards show a significant gap, with none of those aspects showing a similar visibility of women and men in limnology. This article raises awareness of the obstacles that women in limnology faced and still face, and encourages to embrace models of leadership, scientific management, and assessment of research performance far from those commonly established.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Simulating rewetting events in intermittent rivers and ephemeral streams: a global analysis of leached nutrients and organic matter

Climate change and human pressures are changing the global distribution and extent of intermittent rivers and ephemeral streams (IRES), which comprise half of the global river network area. IRES are characterized by periods of flow cessation, during which channel substrates accumulate and undergo physico‐chemical changes (preconditioning), and periods of flow resumption, when these substrates are rewetted and release pulses of dissolved nutrients and organic matter (OM). However, there are no estimates of the amounts and quality of leached substances, nor is there information on the underlying environmental constraints operating at the global scale. We experimentally simulated, under standard laboratory conditions, rewetting of leaves, riverbed sediments, and epilithic biofilms collected during the dry phase across 205 IRES from five major climate zones. We determined the amounts and qualitative characteristics of the leached nutrients and OM, and estimated their areal fluxes from riverbeds. In addition, we evaluated the variance in leachate characteristics in relation to selected environmental variables and substrate characteristics. We found that sediments, due to their large quantities within riverbeds, contribute most to the overall flux of dissolved substances during rewetting events (56‐98%), and that flux rates distinctly differ among climate zones. Dissolved organic carbon, phenolics, and nitrate contributed most to the areal fluxes. The largest amounts of leached substances were found in the continental climate zone, coinciding with the lowest potential bioavailability of the leached organic matter. The opposite pattern was found in the arid zone. Environmental variables expected to be modified under climate change (i.e. potential evapotranspiration, aridity, dry period duration, land use) were correlated with the amount of leached substances, with the strongest relationship found for sediments. These results show that the role of IRES should be accounted for in global biogeochemical cycles, especially because prevalence of IRES will increase due to increasing severity of drying events

Simulating rewetting events in intermittent rivers and ephemeral streams: A global analysis of leached nutrients and organic matter

Climate change and human pressures are changing the global distribution and the ex‐ tent of intermittent rivers and ephemeral streams (IRES), which comprise half of the global river network area. IRES are characterized by periods of flow cessation, during which channel substrates accumulate and undergo physico‐chemical changes (precon‐ ditioning), and periods of flow resumption, when these substrates are rewetted and release pulses of dissolved nutrients and organic matter (OM). However, there are no estimates of the amounts and quality of leached substances, nor is there information on the underlying environmental constraints operating at the global scale. We experi‐ mentally simulated, under standard laboratory conditions, rewetting of leaves, river‐ bed sediments, and epilithic biofilms collected during the dry phase across 205 IRES from five major climate zones. We determined the amounts and qualitative character‐ istics of the leached nutrients and OM, and estimated their areal fluxes from riverbeds. In addition, we evaluated the variance in leachate characteristics in relation to selected environmental variables and substrate characteristics. We found that sediments, due to their large quantities within riverbeds, contribute most to the overall flux of dis‐ solved substances during rewetting events (56%–98%), and that flux rates distinctly differ among climate zones. Dissolved organic carbon, phenolics, and nitrate contrib‐ uted most to the areal fluxes. The largest amounts of leached substances were found in the continental climate zone, coinciding with the lowest potential bioavailability of the leached OM. The opposite pattern was found in the arid zone. Environmental vari‐ ables expected to be modified under climate change (i.e. potential evapotranspiration, aridity, dry period duration, land use) were correlated with the amount of leached sub‐ stances, with the strongest relationship found for sediments. These results show that the role of IRES should be accounted for in global biogeochemical cycles, especially because prevalence of IRES will increase due to increasing severity of drying event

Clonal chromosomal mosaicism and loss of chromosome Y in elderly men increase vulnerability for SARS-CoV-2

The pandemic caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2, COVID-19) had an estimated overall case fatality ratio of 1.38% (pre-vaccination), being 53% higher in males and increasing exponentially with age. Among 9578 individuals diagnosed with COVID-19 in the SCOURGE study, we found 133 cases (1.42%) with detectable clonal mosaicism for chromosome alterations (mCA) and 226 males (5.08%) with acquired loss of chromosome Y (LOY). Individuals with clonal mosaic events (mCA and/or LOY) showed a 54% increase in the risk of COVID-19 lethality. LOY is associated with transcriptomic biomarkers of immune dysfunction, pro-coagulation activity and cardiovascular risk. Interferon-induced genes involved in the initial immune response to SARS-CoV-2 are also down-regulated in LOY. Thus, mCA and LOY underlie at least part of the sex-biased severity and mortality of COVID-19 in aging patients. Given its potential therapeutic and prognostic relevance, evaluation of clonal mosaicism should be implemented as biomarker of COVID-19 severity in elderly people. Among 9578 individuals diagnosed with COVID-19 in the SCOURGE study, individuals with clonal mosaic events (clonal mosaicism for chromosome alterations and/or loss of chromosome Y) showed an increased risk of COVID-19 lethality

A922 Sequential measurement of 1 hour creatinine clearance (1-CRCL) in critically ill patients at risk of acute kidney injury (AKI)

Meeting abstrac

Economic inequality and attitudes toward democracy

La desigualdad económica y el funcionamiento de la democracia son dos de los temas más relevantes y con efectos más importantes en las sociedades contemporáneas. La desigualdad en el mundo y en España ha crecido rápidamente en los últimos años (Piketty, 2020) y se espera que siga creciendo en el futuro (Alvaredo et al., 2017) si no se toman medidas concretas para evitarlo (Farhat, 2020; Stiglitz, 2016). Además, la popularidad de las democracias en todo el mundo y la satisfacción con el funcionamiento de la democracia y las instituciones democráticas han disminuido (Brosius et al., 2020; Catterberg & Moreno, 2006; Freedom House, 2021). Así, en esta tesis pretendemos analizar la relación entre la desigualdad económica y las actitudes hacia la democracia. En particular, la parte empírica de esta tesis trata de averiguar cómo afectan las percepciones de desigualdad económica a la confianza en las instituciones, las percepciones y la satisfacción con el sistema político democrático, las percepciones de eficacia política de la ciudadanía y el comportamiento cívico y político (es decir, las intenciones de cooperar y participar en acciones colectivas). La presente tesis se estructura en tres secciones. La primera sección, el Capítulo 1, presenta el marco conceptual. En el Capítulo 2 esbozamos nuestras preguntas de investigación y los objetivos específicos de las mismas. En la segunda parte, presentamos los estudios empíricos. En el Capítulo 3, nos propusimos adaptar la escala de apoyo a la desigualdad económica (SEIS, Wiwad et al., 2019), y examinamos mediante dos estudios correlacionales cómo se relaciona con otras variables sociopolíticas. Nuestros resultados mostraron que SEIS presenta evidencias de validez y fiabilidad. Por ejemplo, se demostró que esta medida se encuentra estrechamente relacionada con otras medidas de actitudes hacia la desigualdad, y con la percepción de calidez y competencia de las personas en situación de pobreza En el Capítulo 4 realizamos tres experimentos para examinar el efecto de la desigualdad percibida en la confianza institucional, la democracia percibida, la satisfacción con la democracia, la eficacia política y las acciones colectivas dirigidas a la preservación del medioambiente. Hallamos que las percepciones de desigualdad influyen en las actitudes hacia el sistema político, concretamente reduciendo la confianza institucional de los individuos, la democracia percibida, la satisfacción con la democracia y la eficacia política. También investigamos los mecanismos psicológicos que explican esos efectos. Nuestra investigación demostró que la confianza institucional es uno de los mecanismos que explica la relación entre la desigualdad económica percibida y la eficacia política o entre la primera y la intención de participar en acciones colectivas. En el Capítulo 5 nos propusimos analizar el efecto causal de la desigualdad económica y la elección democrática sobre el comportamiento cooperativo utilizando un juego económico. Encontramos que en la condición de desigualdad económica los niveles de cooperación fueron más bajos que en el contexto de baja desigualdad económica. Aunque no encontramos pruebas del efecto positivo de la condición de elección democrática (frente a la no democrática) sobre la cooperación, ya que nuestros resultados mostraron que cuando se introducía una regla cooperativa —mediante un procedimiento democrático o no— para motivar la cooperación, las diferencias entre las condiciones de desigualdad desaparecían. En el Capítulo 6, manipulamos la democracia percibida y examinamos su impacto en la desigualdad inferida. Como esperábamos, percibir que en un contexto predomina un sistema democrático (frente a un contexto no democrático) provocó inferencias sobre la desigualdad económica más bajas. La percepción de la democracia también afectó a otras características percibidas del contexto, como el desempeño económico, la riqueza y el desarrollo económico. En la tercera y última parte de esta tesis (Capítulo 7), discutimos nuestros resultados de acuerdo con las preguntas que guiaron la investigación. También destacamos las implicaciones de las conclusiones de la presente investigación, las limitaciones de los estudios realizados y nuevas ideas para futuras líneas de investigación. En resumen, la desigualdad económica afecta negativamente al funcionamiento del sistema sociopolítico, lo que en última instancia conduce a la desigualdad política. La desigualdad económica percibida afecta a las actitudes hacia la democracia y el sistema político en general, y reduce el interés por participar en política, lo que también contribuye a la desigualdad política. Como consecuencia, las decisiones políticas beneficiarán a la población de manera desigual, lo que en última instancia contribuiría al mantenimiento de la desigualdad económica (Bartels, 2016; Farhat, 2020).Economic inequality and the functioning of democracy are two of the most relevant and controversial issues in contemporary societies. Inequality in the world and in Spain has proliferated in recent years (Piketty, 2019) and is expected to continue growing in the future (Alvaredo et al., 2018) if no concrete measures are taken to prevent it (Farhat, 2020; Stiglitz, 2016). Furthermore, the popularity of democracies around the world, and the satisfaction with the way democracy and democratic institutions work have declined (Brosius et al., 2020; Catterberg & Moreno, 2006; Freedom House, 2021). Accordingly, in this dissertation, we aim to analyze the relationship between economic inequality and attitudes toward democracy. Particularly, the empirical part of this thesis tried to find out how perceptions of economic inequality affect trust in institutions, perceptions of and satisfaction with the democratic political system, perceptions of citizens' political efficacy, and civic and political behavior (i.e., intentions to cooperate and participate in collective action). The current dissertation is structured in three sections. The first section, Chapter 1, presents the conceptual framework. In Chapter 2, we outline our research questions, aims, and specific objectives. In the second part, we present the empirical studies. In Chapter 3, we aimed to adapt the support for economic inequality scale (SEIS, Wiwad et al., 2019), and examined through two correlational studies how it is related to other socio-political variables. Our results showed that SEIS has good sources of validity and reliability evidence. For instance, it showed that it is closely related to other measures of attitudes toward inequality, and to perceived warmth and competence of people in poverty. In Chapter 4, we conducted three experiments to examine the effect of perceived inequality on institutional trust, perceived democracy, satisfaction with democracy, political efficacy, and environmental collective actions. We found that perceptions of inequality influence attitudes toward the political system, specifically reducing individuals' institutional trust, perceived democracy, satisfaction with democracy, and political efficacy. We also aimed to explore the psychological mechanisms that explain those effects. Our research showed that institutional trust mediates the effect of perceived inequality on political efficacy, and on intentions to participate in collective action. In Chapter 5, we aimed to analyze the causal effect of economic inequality and democratic choice on cooperative behavior using an economic game. We found that in the economic inequality condition, levels of cooperation were lower compared with contexts of low economic inequality. Although we found no evidence for the positive effect of the democratic (vs. non-democratic) choice condition on cooperation, results showed that when a cooperative rule— through a democratic procedure or not— was introduced to motivate cooperation, the differences between inequality conditions disappeared. In Chapter 6, we manipulated perceived democracy and examined its impact on inferred inequality. As expected, perceiving a highly democratic context (vs. a nondemocratic context) trigger lower levels of inferred economic inequality. Perceiving democracy also affected other perceived features of the context, such as economic performance, wealth, and economic development. In the third and last part of this thesis (Chapter 7), we discuss our findings in accordance with our guiding research questions. We also highlight the implications of the current research findings, the limitations of the studies conducted, and new ideas for future lines of research. In short, economic inequality negatively affects the functioning of the socio-political system, ultimately leading to political inequality. Perceived economic inequality affects attitudes toward democracy and the political system in general, and reduces interest in participating in politics, which also contributes to political inequality. Consequently, political decisions will benefit the population unequally, thus ultimately contributing to the maintenance of economic inequality (Bartels, 2016; Farhat, 2020).Tesis Univ. Granada.Formación del Profesorado Universitario (FPU; Ministerio de Educación y Formación Profesional, Gobierno de España) concedido a la doctoranda (Ref. FPU17/05945)Proyectos de investigación del Ministerio de Economía y Competitividad de España (B-SEJ-128-UGR18; PCI2020-112285Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación de España (PID2019-105643GB-I00 / Agencia Estatal de Investigación [SRA] /10.13039/501100011033)Junta de Andalucía (105643GB-100

Fact-checking on Twitter: An analysis of the hashtag #StopBulos

La verificación de noticias falsas es una herramienta importante para mejorar la calidad de la información que circula en redes virtuales. Aunque existen distintas agencias de verificación de noticias, también encontramos algunas estrategias más informales como el uso del hashtag #Stopbulos. Así, la presente investigación pretende realizar una caracterización del hashtag #StopBulos en Twitter como forma de verificación de la información y de control de la difusión de fake news. Los resultados mostraron que existía diversidad entre los usuarios y las temáticas de los tuits que incluían dicho hashtag, mientras que la principal función era desmentir fake news. No obstante, se encontró que aquellos que conseguían una mayor difusión eran los usuarios con mayor número de seguidores y carácter institucional. Se discuten las implicaciones del uso del hashtag #StopBulos como una herramienta que permite identificar información falsa en redes sociales.The fact-checking is an important tool to improve the quality of the information that circulates in virtual networks. Although there are different fact-checking verification agencies, we also found some more informal strategies such as the use of the hashtag #Stopbulos. Thus, this research aims to characterize the #StopBulos hashtag on Twitter as a way to verify information and control the spread of fake news. The results showed that there was diversity among users and the themes of the tweets that included this hashtag, while the main function was to deny fake news. However, it was found that those who achieved greater dissemination were the users with the largest number of followers and institutional character. The implications of using the #StopBulos hashtag as a tool to identify false information on social networks are discussed

The Effect of Economic Inequality on Individuals' Cooperative Behavior Using an Economic Game

In this study we tested whether economic inequality and democratic choices affected individuals' cooperative behavior. We expected two main effects: First one of inequality on cooperation and another of democratic choice on cooperation. We used the public goods game (N = 479), in which participants were given a certain number of tokens and decided how many they wanted to keep in their private fund and how many they wanted to share in the public goods. To manipulate economic inequality, we distributed participants’ initial tokens either equally, unequally or very unequally. To manipulation democratic choice, we presented a prescriptive norm to punish the free-riders, either chosen by the participants or imposed. Cooperative behavior was measured by the number of tokens that participants invested in the public goods ark. A mix design was used, including one between participants manipulated factor (democratic choice) and other one manipulated within participants (inequality distribution). As predicted, our findings showed a significant difference between the high and the low inequality condition on cooperative behavior. Participants cooperate with more tokens in the low (vs. high) inequality condition. However, when the prescriptive norm was introduced, this difference between inequality conditions disappeared. No differences in cooperation were found when the prescriptive norm was either democratically voted or imposed. Our findings showed evidence about the reduction of cooperation in unequal contexts. Additionally, prescriptive norms could reduce differences in cooperative behavior independently of inequality levels. The results show that the study of prescriptive norms could contribute to foment redistribution and tax compliance.N