501 research outputs found
Brand Information Mitigating Negative Shocks on Animal Welfare: Is It More Effective to “Distract†Consumers or Make Them Aware?
To create and sustain a competitive advantage in markets that increasingly value animal welfare attributes, meat companies need to meet public and private production standards while communicating to final consumers through their brands. Data are collected from a representative sample of 460 U.S. residents through an on-line experiment on McDonald’s chicken breast sandwiches and analyzed with Latent Growth Modeling. This study assesses which content of positive brand information effectively mitigates the risk of negative information shocks on animal welfare. On average, brand information has the same positive impact on consumers’ beliefs and attitudes, regardless of whether it is related or unrelated to animal welfare. However, there is strong market segmentation in terms of consumers’ response when exposed to brand information, suggesting that brand managers would benefit from tailoring brand information according to consumers’ age, education, gender and income.animal welfare, brand, information, consumer behavior, multivariate statistics, Agribusiness, Livestock Production/Industries, Q1,
Brand coopetition with geographical indications: Which information does lead to brand differentiation?
Farmers and managers marketing food products with Geographical Indications (GIs) have to play a brand coopetition game: they cooperate with each other to develop a collective GI equity, yet they compete to build their individual brand and to establish market channels. Based on an online experiment on olive oil from “Riviera Ligure” (a region in North-Western Italy) through a convenient sample, this study tests a path model to 1) analyze which types and which sources of GI information differentiate an individual brand with GI from the others; and 2) explore which psychological and demographic variables play a role on the impact of GI informationon brand differentiation. The tested path model combines elements of economic consumer theory (Lancaster, 1966) and theory of attitude formation (Fishbein, 1967; Fishbein and Ajzen, 1975). Results cannot be generalized outside the observed product and sample, yet the method is applicable by the GI food industryas a consumer research tool to set up marketing communication strategies
A model of diffuse Galactic Radio Emission from 10 MHz to 100 GHz
Understanding diffuse Galactic radio emission is interesting both in its own
right and for minimizing foreground contamination of cosmological measurements.
Cosmic Microwave Background experiments have focused on frequencies > 10 GHz,
whereas 21 cm tomography of the high redshift universe will mainly focus on <
0.2 GHz, for which less is currently known about Galactic emission. Motivated
by this, we present a global sky model derived from all publicly available
total power large-area radio surveys, digitized with optical character
recognition when necessary and compiled into a uniform format, as well as the
new Villa Elisa data extending the 1.4 GHz map to the entire sky. We quantify
statistical and systematic uncertainties in these surveys by comparing them
with various global multi-frequency model fits. We find that a principal
component based model with only three components can fit the 11 most accurate
data sets (at 10, 22, 45 & 408 MHz and 1.4, 2.3, 23, 33, 41, 61, 94 GHz) to an
accuracy around 1%-10% depending on frequency and sky region. Both our data
compilation and our software returning a predicted all-sky map at any frequency
from 10 MHz to 100 GHz are publicly available at
http://space.mit.edu/home/angelica/gsm .Comment: Accuracy improved with 5-year WMAP data. Our data, software and new
foreground-cleaned WMAP map are available at https://ascl.net/1011.01
Методи управління екологічними ризиками в системі забезпечення економічного розвитку регіону
Метою статті є дослідження методів управління екологічними ризиками в системі забезпечення економічного розвитку регіону
Future Directions for Cardiovascular Disease Comparative Effectiveness Research Report of a Workshop Sponsored by the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute
Comparative effectiveness research (CER) aims to provide decision makers with the evidence needed to evaluate the benefits and harms of alternative clinical management strategies. CER has become a national priority, with considerable new research funding allocated. Cardiovascular disease is a priority area for CER. This workshop report provides an overview of CER methods, with an emphasis on practical clinical trials and observational treatment comparisons. The report also details recommendations to the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute for a new framework for evidence development to foster cardiovascular CER, and specific studies to address 8 clinical issues identified by the Institute of Medicine as high priorities for cardiovascular CER
Radio observational constraints on Galactic 3D-emission models
(Abridged) We constrain simulated all-sky maps in total intensity, linear
polarization, and rotation measure (RM) by observations. We test a number of
large-scale magnetic field configurations and take the properties of the warm
interstellar medium into account. From a comparison of simulated and observed
maps we are able to constrain the regular large-scale Galactic magnetic field
in the disk and the halo of the Galaxy. The local regular field is 2 microG and
the average random field is about 3 microG. The known local excess of
synchrotron emission originating either from enhanced CR electrons or random
magnetic fields is able to explain the observed high-latitude synchrotron
emission. The thermal electron model (NE2001) in conjunction with a proper
filling factor accounts for the observed optically thin thermal emission and
low frequency absorption by optically thick emission. A coupling factor between
thermal electrons and the random magnetic field component is proposed, which in
addition to the small filling factor of thermal electrons increases small-scale
RM fluctuations and thus accounts for the observed depolarization at 1.4 GHz.
We conclude that an axisymmetric magnetic disk field configuration with
reversals inside the solar circle fits available observations best. Out of the
plane a strong toroidal magnetic field with different signs above and below the
plane is needed to account for the observed high-latitude RMs. Our preferred
3D-model fits the observations better than other models over a wide frequency
range.Comment: 20 pages, 19 figures, accepted for publication in A&A, for full
resolution version see
ftp://ftp.mpifr-bonn.mpg.de/outgoing/p098wre/sun-etal.pd
Obesity: should there be a law against it? Introduction to a symposium
The rapid rise in rates of overweight and obesity among adults and children in Australia and New Zealand has intensified debate about the most effective policies for obesity prevention. Law has much to contribute to this policy discussion, although its role is often misunderstood. The articles in this symposium follow on from a conference hosted in September 2006 by the Centre for Health Governance, Law & Ethics in the Faculty of Law, University of Sydney, titled: Obesity: should there be a law against it? In different ways, these articles provide a variety of perspectives on regulatory responses to obesity, including theoretical justifications for a legal approach, conceptual models that assist in making sense of law's role, as well as specific legal strategies for obesity prevention in various settings
Induced pseudoscalar coupling of the proton weak interaction
The induced pseudoscalar coupling is the least well known of the weak
coupling constants of the proton's charged--current interaction. Its size is
dictated by chiral symmetry arguments, and its measurement represents an
important test of quantum chromodynamics at low energies. During the past
decade a large body of new data relevant to the coupling has been
accumulated. This data includes measurements of radiative and non radiative
muon capture on targets ranging from hydrogen and few--nucleon systems to
complex nuclei. Herein the authors review the theoretical underpinnings of
, the experimental studies of , and the procedures and uncertainties
in extracting the coupling from data. Current puzzles are highlighted and
future opportunities are discussed.Comment: 58 pages, Latex, Revtex4, prepared for Reviews of Modern Physic
Exploring causality of the association between smoking and Parkinson's disease
Background: The aim of this paper is to investigate the causality of the inverse association between cigarette smoking and Parkinson's disease (PD). The main suggested alternatives include a delaying effect of smoking, reverse causality or an unmeasured confounding related to a low-risk-taking personality trait. Methods: A total of 715 incident PD cases were ascertained in a cohort of 220 494 individuals from NeuroEPIC4PD, a prospective European population-based cohort study including 13 centres in eight countries. Smoking habits were recorded at recruitment. We analysed smoking status, duration, and intensity and exposure to passive smoking in relation to PD onset. Results: Former smokers had a 20% decreased risk and current smokers a halved risk of developing PD compared with never smokers. Strong dose-response relationships with smoking intensity and duration were found. Hazard ratios (HRs) for smoking 30 years 0.54 (95% CI 0.43-0.36) compared with never smokers. The proportional hazard assumption was verified, showing no change of risk over time, arguing against a delaying effect. Reverse causality was disproved by the consistency of dose-response relationships among former and current smokers. The inverse association between passive smoking and PD, HR 0.70 (95% CI 0.49-0.99) ruled out the effect of unmeasured confounding. Conclusions: These results are highly suggestive of a true causal link between smoking and PD, although it is not clear which is the chemical compound in cigarette smoking responsible for the biological effect
Simulating polarized Galactic synchrotron emission at all frequencies, the Hammurabi code
We present a publicly available code called Hammurabi for generating mock
polarized observations of Galactic synchrotron emission for telescopes like
LOFAR, SKA, Planck and WMAP, based on model inputs for the Galactic magnetic
field (GMF), the cosmic-ray density distribution and the thermal electron
density. We also present mock UHECR deflection measure (UDM) maps based on
model inputs for the GMF. In future, when UHECR sources are identified, this
will allow us to define UDM as a GMF probe in a similar way as polarized radio
sources permit us to define rotation measures. To demonstrate the code's
abilities mock observations are compared to real data as a means to constrain
the input parameters of our simulations with a focus on large-scale magnetic
field properties. As expected, attempts at trying to model the synchrotron,
UHECR deflection and RM input parameters, show that any additional
observational data set greatly increases the constraints on the models. The
hammurabi code addresses this by allowing to perform simulations of several
different data sets simultaneously, providing the means for a more reliable
constraint of the magnetized inter-stellar-medium.Comment: Submitted to A&A (Numerical methods and codes section
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