Revising the Body Esteem Scale with a U.S. College Student Sample: Evaluation, Validation, and Uses for the BES-R

The Body Esteem Scale (BES; Franzoi and Shields 1984) has been a primary research tool for over 30 years, yet its factor structure has not been fully assessed since its creation, so a two-study design examined whether the BES needed revision. In Study 1, a series of principal components analyses (PCAs) was conducted using the BES responses of 798 undergraduate students, with results indicating that changes were necessary to improve the scale’s accuracy. In Study 2, 1237 undergraduate students evaluated each BES item, along with a select set of new body items, while also rating each item’s importance to their own body esteem. Body items meeting minimum importance criteria were then utilized in a series of PCAs to develop a revised scale that has strong internal consistency and good convergent and discriminant validity. As with the original BES, the revised BES (BES-R) conceives of body esteem as both gender-specific and multidimensional. Given that the accurate assessment of body esteem is essential in better understanding the link between this construct and mental health, the BES-R can now be used in research to illuminate this link, as well as in prevention and treatment programs for body-image issues. Further implications are discussed

Encoding and perception of 3D orientation

A fundamental task of the visual system is to construct a three-dimensional (3D) representation of the environment from the left and right eyes’ two- dimensional (2D) retinal images. The differences between those images are governed by projective geometry — the mapping of the 3D environment to the two retinae — and are used by the visual system to more precisely estimate depth. As such, one might expect that projective geometry has shaped how the visual system extracts and represents 3D information. Recent work suggests that is indeed the case for 3D motion perception and, moreover, demonstrates that combining existing knowledge of monocular responses to 2D stimuli with a geometry-focused modeling framework can explain noncanonical patterns in binocular responses to 3D stimuli (Bonnen et al., 2020). To both test whether such a framework generalizes to other domains and to advance knowledge of the processing of another 3D scene feature, this dissertation applies a projective-geometry-based framework to the study of 3D orientation, a likely important substrate of 3D shape computations. First, I describe the geometry of 3D orientation, parameterized as slant and tilt, and I establish a projection model that estimates the retinal orientations produced by a slanted line in the environment. I show that the disparity between those orientations could serve as a cue to 3D orientation and demonstrate the impacts of various changes in stimulus parameters. Second, I construct a theoretical neural population model based on existing knowledge of V1 responses to 2D orientation. I use this model to show how slant may impact V1 responses and to generate predictions about patterns that may be present in psychophysical performance. Third, I use V1 response data from Bridge and Cumming (2001), which shows that some binocular neurons have unequal monocular orientation preferences, to build a more directly data-informed population model, and I assess how the recorded neurons’ responses may vary with slant. Finally, I test the ability of human observers to discriminate between slants under various conditions. Perceptual performance generally follows the patterns predicted by the theoretical neural model and varies notably with the cues available to observers. Collectively, this work adds to existing understanding of the encoding and perception of 3D orientation and supports the importance of taking the environment-to-retina transformation into account.Neuroscienc

Cities, Climate Change and the Green Economy: A Thematic Literature Survey

This working paper constitutes an extensive review of the literature concerned with exploring the role of cities in addressing climate change and green employment creation. It identifies five key areas for discussion: (1) greening the local economy; (2) shifting local policy roles and trends in urbanization; (3) policy learning and cross-jurisdictional collaboration; (4) the place of civic participation and engagement; and, (5) the co-benefits of a green economy. These areas will be addressed in an effort to critically explore the following questions: What impacts do cities have on climate change? What role are cities currently playing with regards to the development and implementation of climate change and green economic policies? What barriers do cities face with regards to developing and implementing climate change and green economic policies? What potential is there for policy development?Work in a Warming World (W3

Is Precarious Employment Low Income Employment? The Changing Labour Market in Southern Ontario

This paper examines the association between income and precarious employment, how this association is changing and how it is shaped by gender and race. It explores how precarious employment has spread to even middle income occupations and what this implies for our understanding of contemporary labour markets and employment relationship norms. The findings indicate a need to refine our views of who is in precarious employment and a need to re-evaluate the nature of the Standard Employment Relationship, which we would argue is not only becoming less prevalent, but also transitioning into something that is less secure

Know Your Value: Negotiation Skill Development for Junior Investigators in the Academic Environment—A Report from the American Society of Preventive Oncology\u27s Junior Members Interest Group

The American Society of Preventive Oncology (ASPO) is a professional society for multidisciplinary investigators in cancer prevention and control. One of the aims of ASPO is to enable investigators at all levels to create new opportunities and maximize their success. One strategy adopted by ASPO was to develop the Junior Members Interest Group in 1999. The Interest Group membership includes predoctoral fellows, postdoctoral fellows, and junior faculty members who are provided career development and training opportunities (1). Responsibilities of the members of the Junior Members Interest Group include serving on the ASPO Executive Committee and the Program Planning Committee and organizing professional development sessions at ASPO\u27s annual meeting. As part of the 2014 ASPO annual meeting, the Junior Members Interest Group organized a session entitled “Negotiation Skill Development for Junior Investigators in the Academic Environment.” This interactive session was designed to provide early-career investigators an opportunity to practice their negotiation skills and to receive expert advice and strategies to effectively negotiate new faculty positions in an academic environment. The session focused primarily on negotiating an initial academic appointment from a graduate student or postdoctoral fellow to an assistant professor–level position. In addition to the main focus, the session also covered renegotiation for assistant and associate-level investigators as they navigate through their careers. The session began with an interactive exercise led by Dr. Stephanie A.N. Silvera (Associate Professor of Public Health, Montclair State University, Montclair, NJ) where participants engaged in a mock salary negotiation session with another member of the audience (Table 1). Following the negotiation exercise, Dr. Silvera led a debriefing session. Next, four panelists at different levels in their academic careers were invited to provide their personal perspectives on the topic of effective negotiation: Dr. Faith Fletcher (Assistant Professor of Community Health Sciences, the University of Illinois at Chicago, Chicago, IL) to provide the perspective of a first-year faculty member; Dr. Stephanie A.N. Silvera (Associate Professor of Public Health, Montclair State University, Montclair, NJ) to provide the perspective of a recently tenured faculty member; Dr. Karen Basen-Engquist (Professor of Behavioral Science and Director of the Center for Energy Balance, University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, Houston, TX) to provide the perspective of a senior faculty member; and Dr. Peter G. Shields (Professor and Deputy Director of the Ohio State University Comprehensive Cancer Center, Columbus, OH) to provide the perspective of a senior faculty member with extensive experience on the employer side of an academic appointment negotiation. This report summarizes the main themes that emerged from the negotiation exercise debriefing, the speakers\u27 advice and recommendations, and responses to audience questions during the session

Scintillation efficiency measurement of Na recoils in NaI(Tl) below the DAMA/LIBRA energy threshold

The dark matter interpretation of the DAMA modulation signal depends on the NaI(Tl) scintillation efficiency of nuclear recoils. Previous measurements for Na recoils have large discrepancies, especially in the DAMA/LIBRA modulation energy region. We report a quenching effect measurement of Na recoils in NaI(Tl) from 3keV$_{\text{nr}}$ to 52keV$_{\text{nr}}$, covering the whole DAMA/LIBRA energy region for light WIMP interpretations. By using a low-energy, pulsed neutron beam, a double time-of-flight technique, and pulse-shape discrimination methods, we obtained the most accurate measurement of this kind for NaI(Tl) to date. The results differ significantly from the DAMA reported values at low energies, but fall between the other previous measurements. We present the implications of the new quenching results for the dark matter interpretation of the DAMA modulation signal