Social media is weakening passwords

Passwords are often generated from readily available information such as family names and memorable events. However, people put the same readily available information on social media often times making it available to the general public. We propose an experiment to empirically validate the previous premise as well as develop an algorithm to generate passwords based off participant’s Facebook public information

Facilitating Natural Conversational Agent Interactions: Lessons from a Deception Experiment

This study reports the results of a laboratory experiment exploring interactions between humans and a conversational agent. Using the ChatScript language, we created a chat bot that asked participants to describe a series of images. The two objectives of this study were (1) to analyze the impact of dynamic responses on participants’ perceptions of the conversational agent, and (2) to explore behavioral changes in interactions with the chat bot (i.e. response latency and pauses) when participants engaged in deception. We discovered that a chat bot that provides adaptive responses based on the participant’s input dramatically increases the perceived humanness and engagement of the conversational agent. Deceivers interacting with a dynamic chat bot exhibited consistent response latencies and pause lengths while deceivers with a static chat bot exhibited longer response latencies and pause lengths. These results give new insights on social interactions with computer agents during truthful and deceptive interactions

The restorative role of annexin A1 at the blood–brain barrier

Annexin A1 is a potent anti-inflammatory molecule that has been extensively studied in the peripheral immune system, but has not as yet been exploited as a therapeutic target/agent. In the last decade, we have undertaken the study of this molecule in the central nervous system (CNS), focusing particularly on the primary interface between the peripheral body and CNS: the blood–brain barrier. In this review, we provide an overview of the role of this molecule in the brain, with a particular emphasis on its functions in the endothelium of the blood–brain barrier, and the protective actions the molecule may exert in neuroinflammatory, neurovascular and metabolic disease. We focus on the possible new therapeutic avenues opened up by an increased understanding of the role of annexin A1 in the CNS vasculature, and its potential for repairing blood–brain barrier damage in disease and aging

Rethinking place-making: aligning placeness factors with perceived urban design qualities (PUDQs) to improve the built environment in historical district

Understanding the concept of place is critically important for urban design and place-making practice, and this research attempted to investigate the pathways by which perceived urban design qualities (PUDQs) influence placeness factors in the Chinese context. Twelve hypotheses were developed and combined in a structural equation model for validation. The Tanhualin historical district in Wuhan, China was selected for the analysis. As a result, place attachment was verified as a critical bridge factor that mediated the influence of PUDQs on place satisfaction. Among the five selected PUDQs, walkability and space quality were revealed as the most influential factors associated with place attachment and place satisfaction. Accessibility was actually indirectly beneficial to place-making via the mediation of walkability. Corresponding implications and strategies were discussed to maintain the sense of place for historic districts

Com o diabo no corpo: os terríveis papagaios do Brasil colônia

Desde a Antiguidade, papagaios, periquitos e afins (Psittacidae) fascinaram os europeus por seu vivo colorido e uma notável capacidade de interação com seres humanos. A descoberta do Novo Mundo nada faria além de acrescentar novos elementos ao tráfico de animais exóticos há muito estabelecido pelos europeus com a África e o Oriente. Sem possuir grandes mamíferos, a América tropical participaria desse comércio com o que tinha de mais atrativo, essencialmente felinos, primatas e aves - em particular os papagaios, os quais eram embarcados em bom número. Contudo, a julgar pelos documentos do Brasil colônia, esses voláteis podiam inspirar muito pouca simpatia, pois nenhum outro animal - exceto as formigas - foi tantas vezes mencionado como praga para a agricultura. Além disso, alguns psitácidas mostravam-se tão loquazes que inspiravam a séria desconfiança de serem animais demoníacos ou possessos, pois só três classes de entidades - anjos, homens e demônios - possuíam o dom da palavra. Nos dias de hoje, vários representantes dos Psittacidae ainda constituem uma ameaça para a agricultura, enquanto os indivíduos muito faladores continuam despertando a suspeita de estarem possuídos pelo demônio. Transcendendo a mera curiosidade, essa crença exemplifica o quão intrincadas podem ser as relações do homem com o chamado “mundo natural”, revelando um universo mais amplo e multifacetado do que se poderia supor a princípio. Nesse sentido, a existência de aves capazes de falar torna essa relação ainda mais complexa e evidencia que as dificuldades de estabelecer o limite entre o animal e o humano se estendem além dos primatas e envolvem as mais inusitadas espécies zoológicas.Since ancient times, parrots and their allies (Psittacidae) have fascinated Europeans by their striking colors and notable ability to interact with human beings. The discovery of the New World added new species to the international exotic animal trade, which for many centuries had brought beasts to Europe from Africa and the Orient. Lacking large mammals, tropical America participated in this trade with its most appealing species, essentially felines, primates and birds - especially parrots - which were shipped in large numbers. It should be noted, however, that at times these birds were not well liked. In fact, according to documents from colonial Brazil, only the ants rank higher than parrots as the animals most often mentioned as agricultural pests. On the other hand, some of these birds were so chatty that people suspected them to be demonic or possessed animals, since only three classes of beings - angels, men and demons - have the ability to speak. Nowadays, several Psittacidae still constitute a threat to agriculture, and the suspicion that extremely talkative birds were demon possessed has also survived. More than a joke or a mere curiosity, this belief exemplifies how intricate man’s relationships with the “natural world” may be. In this sense, the existence of birds that are able to speak adds a further twist to these relationships, demonstrating that the problem of establishing a boundary between the animal and the human does not only involve primates, but also includes some unusual zoological species

Convalescent plasma in patients admitted to hospital with COVID-19 (RECOVERY): a randomised controlled, open-label, platform trial

SummaryBackground Azithromycin has been proposed as a treatment for COVID-19 on the basis of its immunomodulatoryactions. We aimed to evaluate the safety and efficacy of azithromycin in patients admitted to hospital with COVID-19.Methods In this randomised, controlled, open-label, adaptive platform trial (Randomised Evaluation of COVID-19Therapy [RECOVERY]), several possible treatments were compared with usual care in patients admitted to hospitalwith COVID-19 in the UK. The trial is underway at 176 hospitals in the UK. Eligible and consenting patients wererandomly allocated to either usual standard of care alone or usual standard of care plus azithromycin 500 mg once perday by mouth or intravenously for 10 days or until discharge (or allocation to one of the other RECOVERY treatmentgroups). Patients were assigned via web-based simple (unstratified) randomisation with allocation concealment andwere twice as likely to be randomly assigned to usual care than to any of the active treatment groups. Participants andlocal study staff were not masked to the allocated treatment, but all others involved in the trial were masked to theoutcome data during the trial. The primary outcome was 28-day all-cause mortality, assessed in the intention-to-treatpopulation. The trial is registered with ISRCTN, 50189673, and ClinicalTrials.gov, NCT04381936.Findings Between April 7 and Nov 27, 2020, of 16 442 patients enrolled in the RECOVERY trial, 9433 (57%) wereeligible and 7763 were included in the assessment of azithromycin. The mean age of these study participants was65·3 years (SD 15·7) and approximately a third were women (2944 [38%] of 7763). 2582 patients were randomlyallocated to receive azithromycin and 5181 patients were randomly allocated to usual care alone. Overall,561 (22%) patients allocated to azithromycin and 1162 (22%) patients allocated to usual care died within 28 days(rate ratio 0·97, 95% CI 0·87–1·07; p=0·50). No significant difference was seen in duration of hospital stay (median10 days [IQR 5 to >28] vs 11 days [5 to >28]) or the proportion of patients discharged from hospital alive within 28 days(rate ratio 1·04, 95% CI 0·98–1·10; p=0·19). Among those not on invasive mechanical ventilation at baseline, nosignificant difference was seen in the proportion meeting the composite endpoint of invasive mechanical ventilationor death (risk ratio 0·95, 95% CI 0·87–1·03; p=0·24).Interpretation In patients admitted to hospital with COVID-19, azithromycin did not improve survival or otherprespecified clinical outcomes. Azithromycin use in patients admitted to hospital with COVID-19 should be restrictedto patients in whom there is a clear antimicrobial indication

Understanding Changes in Individual and Firm Behavior in Response to Security and Privacy Factors

We investigate consumer and firm responses to information privacy and security factors across three unique essays. The first essay uses three experiments across two different populations (college students and Amazon Mechanical Turk workers) to capture consumer valuations for an information disclosure. Each experiment manipulates characteristics of a required privacy disclosure by altering the information context, intended secondary use of the disclosed private information, and the requirement to disclose personally identifiable information. Across the three experiments, we consistently observe null effects for each of the privacy factors with the exception of two population dependent exceptions. Our participants do acknowledge the increased risk introduced by the experimental factors and the increased saliency and awareness from experiments two and three lead to higher privacy valuations on average. However, there is no consistent manifestation as signification main effects for the three privacy factors. The second essay analyzes firms experiencing multiple data breaches and determines which policies in data breach notification laws are effective deterrents. The results from estimating a parametric hazard model indicate that allowing the individual responsible for maliciously breaching a firm’s data and requiring firms disclose breach information to a state attorney general deter firms from subsequent breaches. We also find that states that do not require breach notification when consumers are unlikely to be harmed see an increase in risk of future breach. Additionally, we investigate the relationship between industry type and breach type as well as prior breach type and subsequent breach type. Our results suggest that government agencies are more likely to have an internal breach, educational institutions are more likely to experience system hacking, and retail businesses are more susceptible to employee related breaches. The relationship between prior and subsequent breach types indicates that firms are more likely to experience future data breaches of the same type. The third essay focuses on data breaches within hospitals by studying the effect of breaches on patient outcomes through changes in process of care. We merge several sources of data to create a unique panel data set containing information on hospitals’ healthcare information technology characteristics, process of care measures, meaningful use attestation, and data breach experience. Estimating a 2SLS fixed effect panel data model provides that experiencing a data breach leads to improvements in process of care. Meaningful use attestation, on the other hand, reduces the process of care for common medical conditions. We also find that improving the process of care for medical conditions leads to better patient outcomes for those conditions. Thus, our findings demonstrate that through influencing the process of care a data breach improves patient outcomes while achieving meaningful use worsens patient outcomes. The combination of these three essays offers a unique perspective into how consumers and firms perceive information privacy and security. Ultimately, consumers and firms demonstrate that information privacy and security is not a priority unless proper incentive mechanisms and adequate information are present

Avoidable mortality: The mediating role of communication in health IT

The adoption of health IT transforms communication between care providers and patients. Unfortunately, research on the transformation of communication has produced conflicting results, creating tension regarding its efficacy among healthcare professionals. In this paper, we propose that nurse and physician communication performance mediate the relationship between health IT implementation and patient outcomes. We test the mediating role of communication with a hospital-level data set spanning 2011 through 2015. The specific health information technologies we investigate include EMR documentation, computerized physician order entry (CPOE) systems, clinical decision support (CDS) systems, and health information exchanges (HIE). Our results provide that EMR documentation, CPOE, and HIE directly improve communication between care providers and patients as well as patient outcomes. Further, nurse-patient and physician-patient communication mediates the relationship between health IT implementation and patient outcomes. The mediating effect extends the positive benefits to patient outcomes following technology implementation. We also find that poor communication with patients directly increases mortality, decreases satisfaction, and decreases loyalty. Surprisingly, CDS has a negative relationship on communication and patient outcomes. Our findings contribute to the information systems and healthcare literatures by demonstrating the need to account for the multidimensional nature of healthcare and by providing context for the positive and negative effects previously discovered. Furthermore, the results offer practical and theoretical implications for leveraging specific health IT adoption and for realigning federal incentive structures for hospitals.24 month embargo; available online: 28 February 2022This item from the UA Faculty Publications collection is made available by the University of Arizona with support from the University of Arizona Libraries. If you have questions, please contact us at [email protected]