Rural-to-Urban Labor Migration, Household Livelihoods, and the Rural Environment in Chongqing Municipality, Southwest China

Rural migration and its relationship to the rural environment have attracted increasing research interest in recent decades. Rural migration constitutes a key component of human population movement, while rural areas contain most of the world’s natural resources such as land and forests. This study empirically evaluates a conceptual framework incorporating rural household livelihoods as an integrative mediating factor between rural migration and the rural environment in the context of rural-to-urban labor migration in Chongqing Municipality, Southwest China. The analysis draws on data collected through household surveys and key informant interviews from four villages. Results confirm the hypothesis that labor-migrant and non-labor-migrant households differ significantly in livelihood activities including agricultural production, agricultural technology use, income and consumption, and resource use and management. Implications for the subsequent environmental outcomes of rural labor out-migration and corresponding natural resource management and policy in rural origin areas are discussed

Involvement of right STS in audio-visual integration for affective speech demonstrated using MEG

Speech and emotion perception are dynamic processes in which it may be optimal to integrate synchronous signals emitted from different sources. Studies of audio-visual (AV) perception of neutrally expressed speech demonstrate supra-additive (i.e., where AV>[unimodal auditory+unimodal visual]) responses in left STS to crossmodal speech stimuli. However, emotions are often conveyed simultaneously with speech; through the voice in the form of speech prosody and through the face in the form of facial expression. Previous studies of AV nonverbal emotion integration showed a role for right (rather than left) STS. The current study therefore examined whether the integration of facial and prosodic signals of emotional speech is associated with supra-additive responses in left (cf. results for speech integration) or right (due to emotional content) STS. As emotional displays are sometimes difficult to interpret, we also examined whether supra-additive responses were affected by emotional incongruence (i.e., ambiguity). Using magnetoencephalography, we continuously recorded eighteen participants as they viewed and heard AV congruent emotional and AV incongruent emotional speech stimuli. Significant supra-additive responses were observed in right STS within the first 250 ms for emotionally incongruent and emotionally congruent AV speech stimuli, which further underscores the role of right STS in processing crossmodal emotive signals

Regime shifts in a socio-ecological model of farmland abandonment

We developed a mathematical model with two-way linked socio-ecological dynamics to study farmland abandonment and to understand the regimes shifts of this socio-ecological system. The model considers that migration is a collective behavior socio-economically driven and that the ecosystem is dynamic. The model identifies equilibria that vary from mass migration, farmland abandonment, and forest regeneration, to no migration and forest eradication; partial migration and/or coexistence of farmland and forest also constitute possible equilibria. Overall, the model reflects farmland abandonment processes observed in the field and illustrates the importance of the complex interlinked mechanisms between the social and ecological systems determining farmland abandonment, that are not evident when approached independently. The model dynamics show that the hysteresis on the social dynamics renders regimes shifts difficult to reverse, and that this difficulty is accentuated when considering the ecological system dynamic. Similar models could be applied to other socio-ecological systems to help their management