Parental perceptions of neighborhood effects in Latino comunas: the script of "the delinquent" in understanding drug use, violence, and social disorganization

OBJECTIVES: To obtain rich information about how adult Latinos living in high-poverty/high-drug use neighborhoods perceive and negotiate their environment. METHODS: In 2008, thirteen adult caregivers in Santiago, Chile were interviewed with open-ended questions to ascertain beliefs about neighborhood effects and drug use. ANALYSIS: Inductive analysis was used to develop the codebook/identify trends. DISCUSSION: Residents externalized their understanding of drug use and misuse by invoking the concept of delinquent youth. A typology of their perceptions is offered. Learning more about residents’ circumstances may help focus on needs-based interventions. More research with Latino neighborhoods is needed for culturally-competent models of interventions.The present study received support from National Hispanic Science Network Fellows Summer grant awarded to the lead author. The study was also partially supported by the National Institutes of Health/National Institute on Drug Abuse (R01:DA021181) and the Vivian A. and James L. Curtis School of Social Work Research and Training Center, University of Michigan. (National Hispanic Science Network; R01:DA021181 - National Institutes of Health/National Institute on Drug Abuse; Vivian A. and James L. Curtis School of Social Work Research and Training Center, University of Michigan

Co-Management Strategy for the Sustainable use of Coral Reef Resources in the National Natural Park "Corales del Rosario y San Bernardo" in Colombia

The National Natural Park "Corales del Rosario y San Bernardo", located in the Caribbean Sea, is one of the most important parks in Colombia since it hosts high biological biodiversity, receives more tourists than any other natural park in the country and provides sustenance to several communities settled in and around it. However, lack of governance and incompatibility of incentives among authorities, communities and visitors threaten its conservation and sustainability. Using experimental economic games with fisherman communities, we tested different rules related with the management of natural resources in the protected area. In addition to standard rules of communication and external regulation, we tested a rule called co-management, in which we explored the complementarities between repeated communication and external non-coercive authority intervention. We also tested inter temporal effects where over extraction (by the group) in a round reduces the availability of resource for next round and, in consequence, increases effort and reduces benefits for fishers. Results confirmed the effectiveness of communication and, to some extent, external regulation. More important than that, co-management treatment exhibit no matter the location of the communities with respect to the park- the best results in terms of sustainable use of the resource. Participants incorporated dynamic implications in their decisions when information asymmetries were overcome, through internal communication or external guidance. These results highlight the importance of resource management designs that recognize communities as key actors in decision making for the sustainable use and conservation of common pool resources in protected areas.Resource /Energy Economics and Policy,

DOES DISTANCE MAKE GOOD NEIGHBORS? THE ROLE OF SPATIAL EXTERNALITIES AND INCOME IN RESIDENTIAL DEVELOPMENT PATTERNS

Scattered residential development is explained using a theoretical model of residential location in which household interactions generate externalities that determine location choices. Results demonstrate the role of income and heterogeneous preferences in generating this form of sprawl. Among our findings is that rising income generates only temporary increases in sprawl.Research Methods/ Statistical Methods,

Does scarcity exacerbate the tragedy of the commons? Evidence from fishers’ experimental responses

Economic Experimental Games (EEG) have challenged the theoretical prediction showing that individuals balance own and collective interests when making decisions that deviate away from suboptimal Nash equilibrium. However, few studies have analyzed whether these deviations from Nash equilibrium towards social optimum are affected as the stock of resource changes. Performing EEG with real fishers we test the hypothesis that behavior of participants –measured as relative deviations from Nash equilibrium- differs under a situation of abundance versus a situation of scarcity. The design of our EEG is based on a profit maximization model that incorporates intertemporal effects of aggregated extraction. Our findings show that in a situation of scarcity, players over extract the resource making decisions above the Nash equilibrium, obtaining less profit, mining the others-regarding interest, and exacerbating the tragedy of the commons. This result challenges previous general findings from the EEG literature. When individuals face abundance of the resource, however, they deviate downward from the individualistic and myopic behavior prediction. This phenomenon of private inefficient over exploitation is corrected when management strategies are introduced in the game, which underlines the importance of institutions.Resource /Energy Economics and Policy,

AN ECONOMIC ANALYSIS OF COCA ERADICATION POLICY IN COLOMBIA

We estimate an econometric model of coca production in Colombia. Our results indicate that coca eradication is an ineffective means of supply control as farmers compensate by cultivating the crop more extensively. The evidence further suggests that incentives to produce legal substitute crops may have greater supply-reducing potential than eradication.Political Economy,

Mixing in convective thermal fluxes in unsteady nonhomogeneous flows generating complex three dimensional vorticity patterns

Diffusion and scaling of the velocity and vorticity in a thermoelectric driven heating and cooling experimental device is presented in order to map the different patterns and transitions between two and three dimensional convection in an enclosure with complex driven flows. The size of the water tank is of 0.2 x 0.2 x 0.1 m and the heat sources or sinks can be regulated both in power and sign [1-3]. The thermal convective driven flows are generated by means of Peltier effects in 4 wall extended positions of 0.05 x 0.05 cm each. The parameter range of convective cell array varies strongly with the Topology of the boundary conditions. Side heat and momentum fluxes are a function of Rayleigh, Peclet and Nusselt numbers, [4-6] Visualizations are performed by PIV, Particle tracking and shadowgraph. The structure of the flow is shown by setting up a convective flow generated by buoyant heat fluxes. The experiments described here investigate high Prandtl number mixing using brine and fresh water in order to form a density interface and low Prandtl number mixing with temperature gradients. The evolution of the mixing fronts are compared and the topological characteristics of the merging of the convective structures are examined for different configurations. Based on two dimensional Vorticity spectral analysis, new techniques can be very useful to determine the evolution of scales considering the multi-fractal structure of the convective flows.Peer ReviewedPostprint (published version

Guía metodológica para el personal académico; El espacio europeo de educación superior (EEES)

La presente guía responde a la convocatoria de Proyectos de Innovación y Mejora de la Calidad Docente emitida por la Oficina de Convergencia Europea (OCE) del Vicerrectorado de Desarrollo y Calidad de la Docencia. Su contenido se ajusta también a las líneas de acción que han venido estableciendo el Ministerio de Educación y Cultura (MEC) y el Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación (del que dependen ahora las Universidades) para avanzar en la integración del Espacio Europeo de Educación Superior (EEES), así como al Plan de Acción Estratégica para el curso 2006-2007 de la Facultad de Ciencias Políticas y Sociología en lo que respecta a la adecuación y mejora de la metodología docente. El Objetivo de dicha metodología es el de atender las dificultades de integración del alumno, diseñando canales de ayuda que favorezcan su rendimiento. Esta guía, dirigida al personal académico, expone, por un lado, de manera sucinta, los principales elementos que dan vida al proyecto del EEES y, por otro, el momento en que se encuentra la Facultad de cara al año 2010, fecha escogida para la entrada en operación de dicho proyecto. En el desarrollo de esta guía han participado el secretario de la Facultad de Ciencias Políticas y Sociales, y director del proyecto, Rafael Caballero Sánchez, la vicedecana de Ordenación Académica, Pilar González Martínez, y el investigador Óscar Diego Bautista

Arabidopsis thaliana DOF6 negatively affects germination in non-after ripened seeds and interacts with TCP14

Seed dormancy prevents seeds from germinating under environmental conditions unfavourable for plant growth and development and constitutes an evolutionary advantage. Dry storage, also known as after-ripening, gradually decreases seed dormancy by mechanisms not well understood. An Arabidopsis thaliana DOF transcription factor gene (DOF6) affecting seed germination has been characterized. The transcript levels of this gene accumulate in dry seeds and decay gradually during after-ripening and also upon seed imbibition. While constitutive over-expression of DOF6 produced aberrant growth and sterility in the plant, its over-expression induced upon seed imbibition triggered delayed germination, abscisic acid (ABA)-hypersensitive phenotypes and increased expression of the ABA biosynthetic gene ABA1 and ABA-related stress genes. Wild-type germination and gene expression were gradually restored during seed after-ripening, despite of DOF6-induced over-expression. DOF6 was found to interact in a yeast two-hybrid system andin planta with TCP14, a previously described positive regulator of seed germination. The expression of ABA1 and ABA-related stress genes was also enhanced in tcp14 knock-out mutants. Taken together, these results indicate that DOF6 negatively affects seed germination and opposes TCP14 function in the regulation of a specific set of ABA-related gene