The Development of an On-Line Learning and Teaching Resource for the Socio-Centric Aspects of Sustainable Design

This paper fits into the topics of socially relevant design, design and emotion and sustainable design and explores the question how can we create a more sustainable way of life? The paper also addresses the central theme of the conference – Design Education – creating a better world. This paper reports on the next phase in the development of a web-based learning and teaching resource specifically aimed at the socio-centric dimension of sustainable design which can be found at www.sociocenticdesign.com . A more extensive literature review was conducted, of which a summary is presented, however, the focus is on the outcomes learned from the collection of further primary data. It is confirmed that there is strong dominance by the techno and eco-centric dimensions and that there is a lack of awareness of the socio-centric dimension. It is concluded that being sustainable in design actually is about leaving the final design to later; it means that first and foremost sustainable design is to consider the designs purpose and its effects on the user, the community and society as a whole. An evaluation of two existing web-based resources, that focus on eco-design, was also conducted and informed the outcomes presented in this paper. The paper sets outs in some detail the content, arrangement and suggested web-interfaces for the new learning resource focused on the socio-centric dimension. The content is arranged into the following sections based upon the recommendations generated by Conrad: Past and Future; Time; People; Consumption, Design and Theories. The results of the research suggest that a high level of interactivity in the web-interface will be required

Multiplicative scale uncertainties in the unified approach for constructing confidence intervals

We have investigated how uncertainties in the estimation of the detection efficiency affect the 90% confidence intervals in the unified approach for constructing confidence intervals. The study has been conducted for experiments where the number of detected events is large and can be described by a Gaussian probability density function. We also assume the detection efficiency has a Gaussian probability density and study the range of the relative uncertainties $\sigma_\epsilon$ between 0 and 30%. We find that the confidence intervals provide proper coverage over a wide signal range and increase smoothly and continuously from the intervals that ignore scale uncertainties with a quadratic dependence on $\sigma_\epsilon$.Comment: 22 pages, 7 figures, 2 table

Accelerating Asymptotically Exact MCMC for Computationally Intensive Models via Local Approximations

We construct a new framework for accelerating Markov chain Monte Carlo in posterior sampling problems where standard methods are limited by the computational cost of the likelihood, or of numerical models embedded therein. Our approach introduces local approximations of these models into the Metropolis-Hastings kernel, borrowing ideas from deterministic approximation theory, optimization, and experimental design. Previous efforts at integrating approximate models into inference typically sacrifice either the sampler's exactness or efficiency; our work seeks to address these limitations by exploiting useful convergence characteristics of local approximations. We prove the ergodicity of our approximate Markov chain, showing that it samples asymptotically from the \emph{exact} posterior distribution of interest. We describe variations of the algorithm that employ either local polynomial approximations or local Gaussian process regressors. Our theoretical results reinforce the key observation underlying this paper: when the likelihood has some \emph{local} regularity, the number of model evaluations per MCMC step can be greatly reduced without biasing the Monte Carlo average. Numerical experiments demonstrate multiple order-of-magnitude reductions in the number of forward model evaluations used in representative ODE and PDE inference problems, with both synthetic and real data.Comment: A major update of the theory and example

Global Projections of Household Numbers Using Age Determined Ratios

A new method based upon age determined population ratios is described and used to estimate household population intensities (households per person). Using an additive and a bounded model household projections are given to 2050 for the world and to 2030 for seven fertility transition subgroups (cohorts) of the countries of the world. Based upon United Nations 2002 Revision data, from an estimated 1.56 billion households at 2000, household growth to 2030 is projected to be an additional 1.1 billion households, whether population increase is 1.3 billion persons under the United Nations low fertility variant or 2.7 billion persons under the high fertility variant. At that date over one third of all households are projected to be Chinese or Indian. By 2050 it is projected that there will be 3.3 billion households with a 95 per cent confidence interval on modelling error only of ± 0.5 billion. This compares with 3.2 billion in the Habitat: Global Report on Human Settlements 1996. The apparent similarity of total household growth under various scenarios conceals a wide range in the growth of household intensities across fertility transition cohorts. It is suggested that models, projections and error be reviewed biennially and that household and population projections be produced jointly.Household projections, world, age ratios, fertility

Robust factor analysis in the presence of normality violations, missing data, and outliers: Empirical questions and possible solutions

Although a mainstay of psychometric methods, several reviews suggest factor analysis is often applied without testing whether data support it, and that decision-making process or guiding principles providing evidential support for FA techniques are seldom reported. Researchers often defer such decision-making to the default settings on widely-used software packages, and unaware of their limitations, might unwittingly misuse FA. This paper discusses robust analytical alternatives for answering nine important questions in exploratory factor analysis (EFA), and provides R commands for running complex analysis in the hope of encouraging and empowering substantive researchers on a journey of discovery towards more knowledgeable and judicious use of robust alternatives in FA. It aims to take solutions to problems like skewness, missing values, determining the number of factors to extract, and calculation of standard errors of loadings, and make them accessible to the general substantive researcher

Promoting Holistic Wellness in Honors Students through Peer Coaching

While the conversation in honors about the mental health of students has persisted for over two decades, authors identify a marked increase in the need for student mental health support since the first Generation Z students entered college in 2015. A review of literature in honors indicates upticks in discourse relating to mental health (tn = 66) since 2004, and content analysis shows peaks in publication for 2018 and 2021 (n ≠ 11, respectively). This study describes a peer coaching program that focuses on the holistic wellness and support of honors students. Authors observe a decrease in Behavioral Intervention Team meetings and suicide attempts since the program’s inception in 2015. Programmatic details, including application and selection, training, expectations of peer coaches, assessment, and improvement initiatives are included so that similar programs can be implemented in and beyond honors

Sr\u3csub\u3e3\u3c/sub\u3eZnPtO\u3csub\u3e6\u3c/sub\u3e and Sr\u3csub\u3e3\u3c/sub\u3eCdPtO\u3csub\u3e6\u3c/sub\u3e

The flux synthesis of single crystals of the isostructural compounds tristrontium zinc platinum hexaoxide, Sr3ZnPtO6, and tristrontium cadmium platinum hexaoxide, Sr3CdPtO6, is reported. The compounds adopt the pseudo-one-dimensional rhombohedral K4CdCl6 structure type, and feature chains of face-shared distorted ZnO6 or CdO6 trigonal prisms and PtO6 octahedra, surrounded by columns of Sr2+ ions. All transition metals are located on the threefold axis of symmetry, while the Sr2+ cations lie on twofold axes. Formula: Sr3ZnPtO6 and Sr3CdPtO