Social network ties beyond nonredundancy: An experimental investigation of the effect of knowledge content and tie strength on creativity

This is the author accepted manuscript. The final version is available from American Psychological Association via the DOI in this record.Social network research emphasizes the access to nonredundant knowledge content that network ties provide. I suggest that some content is more beneficial than others and that tie strength may affect creativity for reasons other than the associated structure. That is, tie strength may affect how individuals process nonredundant knowledge. I investigate 2 types of knowledge content-information (i.e., facts or data) and frames (i.e., interpretations or impressions)-and explore whether tie strength influences their effect on creativity. Drawing on creativity theory, I employ an experimental design to provide greater theoretical clarity and to isolate causality. According to the results from 2 studies, distinct frames received from contacts facilitate creativity, but the effect of distinct information is more complex. When individuals receive distinct information from strong ties, it constrains creativity compared to distinct frames. Content from weak ties appears to facilitate creativity across all scenarios. The results of mediated moderation analysis indicate the effect of framing versus information for strong ties is driven by decision-making time, as an indicator of cognitive expansion

The paradox of family structure and plans after work: Why single childless employees may be the least absorbed at work

This is the author accepted manuscript. The final version is available from Academy of Management via the DOI in this record.Existing research has shown that positive family experiences can affect work positively. In this article, however, we consider how family may enhance work even when family experiences are not explicitly positive. We draw on boundary theory and cognitive psychology's current concerns theory to evaluate how employees' family structures and associated after-work activities affect their work absorption. A survey of business school alumni (Study 1) revealed that single, childless workers reported lower absorption than workers with other family structures. Further, a daily diary study of university employees (Study 2) showed that employees' planned after-work activities explained the relationship between family structure and work absorption. Specifically, single, childless workers anticipated fewer domestic after-work activities, resulting in lower work absorption. Due to similarities between domestic responsibilities and work tasks-for example, their obligatory and goal-directed nature-anticipating domestic responsibilities after work reinforces, rather than distracts from, the work mindset, thus keeping employees more immersed psychologically in their work. This finding suggests that having a spouse and/or children can affect employees' work absorption positively through the anticipation of domestic duties after work. Thus, our study contributes to a more comprehensive view of how employees' work and nonwork lives are connected

A social composition view of team creativity: The role of member nationality-heterogeneous ties outside of the team

This is the author accepted manuscript. The final version is available from INFORMS (Institute for Operations Research and Management Sciences) via the DOI in this record. We sought to understand team member informal social network ties outside of the team as a way to achieve cognitive variation within the team, thereby facilitating creativity. Specifically, we take a configural perspective, which emphasizes individual team members and the heterogeneity and strength of their outside ties. We theorize that these characteristics of outside ties are important because they amend members' schemas and the team's cognitive architecture. Results of a study of 82 long-term MBA project teams suggest that both outside ties with nationality-heterogeneous individuals and weak outside ties independently facilitate team creativity. In addition, nationality-heterogeneous outside ties that are weak rather than strong are associated with higher team creative performance

From creativity to innovation: The social network drivers of the four phases of the idea journey

This is the author accepted manuscript. The final version is available from Academy of Management via the DOI in this record.Interest has burgeoned, in recent years, in how social networks influence individual creativity and innovation. From both the theoretical and empirical points of view, this increased attention has generated many inconsistencies. In this article we propose that a conceptualization of the idea journey encompassing phases that the literature has so far overlooked can help solve existing tensions. We conceptualize four phases of the journey of an idea, from conception to completion: idea generation, idea elaboration, idea championing, and idea implementation. We propose that a creator has distinct primary needs in each phase: cognitive flexibility, support, influence, and shared vision, respectively. Individual creators successfully move through a phase when the relational and structural elements of their networks match the distinct needs of the phase. The relational and structural elements that are beneficial for one phase, however, are detrimental for another. We propose that in order to solve this seeming contradiction and the associated paradoxes, individual creators have to change interpretations and frames throughout the different phases. This, in turn, allows them to activate different network characteristics at the appropriate moment and successfully complete the idea journey from novel concept to a tangible outcome that changes the field

Effect of formant frequency spacing on perceived gender in pre-pubertal children's voices

<div><p>Background</p><p>It is usually possible to identify the sex of a pre-pubertal child from their voice, despite the absence of sex differences in fundamental frequency at these ages. While it has been suggested that the overall spacing between formants (formant frequency spacing - ΔF) is a key component of the expression and perception of sex in children's voices, the effect of its continuous variation on sex and gender attribution has not yet been investigated.</p><p>Methodology/Principal findings</p><p>In the present study we manipulated voice ΔF of eight year olds (two boys and two girls) along continua covering the observed variation of this parameter in pre-pubertal voices, and assessed the effect of this variation on adult ratings of speakers' sex and gender in two separate experiments. In the first experiment (sex identification) adults were asked to categorise the voice as either male or female. The resulting identification function exhibited a gradual slope from male to female voice categories. In the second experiment (gender rating), adults rated the voices on a continuum from “masculine boy” to “feminine girl”, gradually decreasing their masculinity ratings as ΔF increased.</p><p>Conclusions/Significance</p><p>These results indicate that the role of ΔF in voice gender perception, which has been reported in adult voices, extends to pre-pubertal children's voices: variation in ΔF not only affects the perceived sex, but also the perceived masculinity or femininity of the speaker. We discuss the implications of these observations for the expression and perception of gender in children's voices given the absence of anatomical dimorphism in overall vocal tract length before puberty.</p></div

The Ecm11-Gmc2 complex promotes synaptonemal complex formation through assembly of transverse filaments in budding yeast

During meiosis, homologous chromosomes pair at close proximity to form the synaptonemal complex (SC). This association is mediated by transverse filament proteins that hold the axes of homologous chromosomes together along their entire length. Transverse filament proteins are highly aggregative and can form an aberrant aggregate called the polycomplex that is unassociated with chromosomes. Here, we show that the Ecm11-Gmc2 complex is a novel SC component, functioning to facilitate assembly of the yeast transverse filament protein, Zip1. Ecm11 and Gmc2 initially localize to the synapsis initiation sites, then throughout the synapsed regions of paired homologous chromosomes. The absence of either Ecm11 or Gmc2 substantially compromises the chromosomal assembly of Zip1 as well as polycomplex formation, indicating that the complex is required for extensive Zip1 polymerization. We also show that Ecm11 is SUMOylated in a Gmc2-dependent manner. Remarkably, in the unSUMOylatable ecm11 mutant, assembly of chromosomal Zip1 remained compromised while polycomplex formation became frequent. We propose that the Ecm11-Gmc2 complex facilitates the assembly of Zip1 and that SUMOylation of Ecm11 is critical for ensuring chromosomal assembly of Zip1, thus suppressing polycomplex formation

Neural correlates of sexual cue reactivity in individuals with and without compulsive sexual behaviours

Although compulsive sexual behaviour (CSB) has been conceptualized as a "behavioural" addiction and common or overlapping neural circuits may govern the processing of natural and drug rewards, little is known regarding the responses to sexually explicit materials in individuals with and without CSB. Here, the processing of cues of varying sexual content was assessed in individuals with and without CSB, focusing on neural regions identified in prior studies of drug-cue reactivity. 19 CSB subjects and 19 healthy volunteers were assessed using functional MRI comparing sexually explicit videos with non-sexual exciting videos. Ratings of sexual desire and liking were obtained. Relative to healthy volunteers, CSB subjects had greater desire but similar liking scores in response to the sexually explicit videos. Exposure to sexually explicit cues in CSB compared to non-CSB subjects was associated with activation of the dorsal anterior cingulate, ventral striatum and amygdala. Functional connectivity of the dorsal anterior cingulate-ventral striatum-amygdala network was associated with subjective sexual desire (but not liking) to a greater degree in CSB relative to non-CSB subjects. The dissociation between desire or wanting and liking is consistent with theories of incentive motivation underlying CSB as in drug addictions. Neural differences in the processing of sexual-cue reactivity were identified in CSB subjects in regions previously implicated in drug-cue reactivity studies. The greater engagement of corticostriatal limbic circuitry in CSB following exposure to sexual cues suggests neural mechanisms underlying CSB and potential biological targets for interventions

Innovation capacity in the healthcare sector and historical anchors: examples from the UK, Switzerland and the US

Innovation is an integral part of economic development in developed economies. In the post 2008 period, a key policy agenda is that of sustainable development, which calls for innovation in all aspects of value-chains. In this paper, we focus on innovation from the biotech—pharma perspective to see whether or not this will lead to a sustainable future for the regions where there are clusters of firms in this sector. We examine data from a recently completed European Union study of innovation in the Healthcare sector from the UK and Switzerland, countries with an historical base in pharma, to understand how innovation pathways vary at the regional level in the broader life sciences, which incorporate biotech and more. Innovation in the healthcare sector in two regions, Oxfordshire in the UK and Zurich in Switzerland are compared. We contextualize our discussion by drawing on studies that focus on the sector in the US, specifically Boston. The analytical framework comprises three elements: innovation systems and national and regional economic development theories are the first two, followed by approaches which consider organizational or institutional activity. This framework is used to help explain and understand the complexity of how innovation is organized at the sub-national level. The overall context is that it is increasing becoming a condition for government financing of research that it has more immediate application in industry or have the possibility of commercialisation (e.g., translational research)

Spatially Explicit Analyses of Anopheline Mosquitoes Indoor Resting Density: Implications for Malaria Control

Background: The question of sampling and spatial aggregation of malaria vectors is central to vector control efforts and estimates of transmission. Spatial patterns of anopheline populations are complex because mosquitoes' habitats and behaviors are strongly heterogeneous. Analyses of spatially referenced counts provide a powerful approach to delineate complex distribution patterns, and contributions of these methods in the study and control of malaria vectors must be carefully evaluated. Methodology/Principal Findings: We used correlograms, directional variograms, Local Indicators of Spatial Association (LISA) and the Spatial Analysis by Distance IndicEs (SADIE) to examine spatial patterns of Indoor Resting Densities (IRD) in two dominant malaria vectors sampled with a 565 km grid over a 2500 km(2) area in the forest domain of Cameroon. SADIE analyses revealed that the distribution of Anopheles gambiae was different from regular or random, whereas there was no evidence of spatial pattern in Anopheles funestus (Ia = 1.644, Pa0.05, respectively). Correlograms and variograms showed significant spatial autocorrelations at small distance lags, and indicated the presence of large clusters of similar values of abundance in An. gambiae while An. funestus was characterized by smaller clusters. The examination of spatial patterns at a finer spatial scale with SADIE and LISA identified several patches of higher than average IRD (hot spots) and clusters of lower than average IRD (cold spots) for the two species. Significant changes occurred in the overall spatial pattern, spatial trends and clusters when IRDs were aggregated at the house level rather than the locality level. All spatial analyses unveiled scale-dependent patterns that could not be identified by traditional aggregation indices. Conclusions/Significance: Our study illustrates the importance of spatial analyses in unraveling the complex spatial patterns of malaria vectors, and highlights the potential contributions of these methods in malaria control

Animal-related factors associated with moderate-to-severe diarrhea in children younger than five years in western Kenya: A matched case-control study

Background Diarrheal disease remains among the leading causes of global mortality in children younger than 5 years. Exposure to domestic animals may be a risk factor for diarrheal disease. The objectives of this study were to identify animal-related exposures associated with cases of moderate-to-severe diarrhea (MSD) in children in rural western Kenya, and to identify the major zoonotic enteric pathogens present in domestic animals residing in the homesteads of case and control children. Methodology/Principal findings We characterized animal-related exposures in a subset of case and control children (n = 73 pairs matched on age, sex and location) with reported animal presence at home enrolled in the Global Enteric Multicenter Study in western Kenya, and analysed these for an association with MSD. We identified potentially zoonotic enteric pathogens in pooled fecal specimens collected from domestic animals resident at children’s homesteads. Variables that were associated with decreased risk of MSD were washing hands after animal contact (matched odds ratio [MOR] = 0.2; 95% CI 0.08–0.7), and presence of adult sheep that were not confined in a pen overnight (MOR = 0.1; 0.02–0.5). Variables that were associated with increased risk of MSD were increasing number of sheep owned (MOR = 1.2; 1.0–1.5), frequent observation of fresh rodent excreta (feces/urine) outside the house (MOR = 7.5; 1.5–37.2), and participation of the child in providing water to chickens (MOR = 3.8; 1.2–12.2). Of 691 pooled specimens collected from 2,174 domestic animals, 159 pools (23%) tested positive for one or more potentially zoonotic enteric pathogens (Campylobacter jejuni, C. coli, non-typhoidal Salmonella, diarrheagenic E. coli, Giardia, Cryptosporidium, or rotavirus). We did not find any association between the presence of particular pathogens in household animals, and MSD in children. Conclusions and significance Public health agencies should continue to promote frequent hand washing, including after animal contact, to reduce the risk of MSD. Future studies should address specific causal relations of MSD with sheep and chicken husbandry practices, and with the presence of rodents