Participatory analysis for adaptation to climate change in Mediterranean agricultural systems: possible choices in process design (versão Pre Print)

There is an increasing call for local measures to adapt to climate change, based on foresight analyses in collaboration with actors. However, such analyses involve many challenges, particularly because the actors concerned may not consider climate change to be an urgent concern. This paper examines the methodological choices made by three research teams in the design and implementation of participatory foresight analyses to explore agricultural and water management options for adaptation to climate change. Case studies were conducted in coastal areas of France, Morocco, and Portugal where the groundwater is intensively used for irrigation, the aquifers are at risk or are currently overexploited, and a serious agricultural crisis is underway. When designing the participatory processes, the researchers had to address four main issues: whether to avoid or prepare dialogue between actors whose relations may be limited or tense; how to select participants and get them involved; how to facilitate discussion of issues that the actors may not initially consider to be of great concern; and finally, how to design and use scenarios. In each case, most of the invited actors responded and met to discuss and evaluate a series of scenarios. Strategies were discussed at different levels, from farming practices to aquifer management. It was shown that such participatory analyses can be implemented in situations which may initially appear to be unfavourable. This was made possible by the flexibility in the methodological choices, in particular the possibility of framing the climate change issue in a broader agenda for discussion with the actors

Low Fidelity Imitation of Atypical Biological Kinematics in Autism Spectrum Disorders Is Modulated by Self-Generated Selective Attention.

We examined whether adults with autism had difficulty imitating atypical biological kinematics. To reduce the impact that higher-order processes have on imitation we used a non-human agent model to control social attention, and removed end-state target goals in half of the trials to minimise goal-directed attention. Findings showed that only neurotypical adults imitated atypical biological kinematics. Adults with autism did, however, become significantly more accurate at imitating movement time. This confirmed they engaged in the task, and that sensorimotor adaptation was self-regulated. The attentional bias to movement time suggests the attenuation in imitating kinematics might be a compensatory strategy due to deficits in lower-level visuomotor processes associated with self-other mapping, or selective attention modulated the processes that represent biological kinematics

Inclusion, measurement and relevance… and Covid-19

This is an accepted manuscript of an article published by Springer in Postdigital Science and Education on 17/08/2020, available online: https://doi.org/10.1007/s42438-020-00182-9 The accepted version of the publication may differ from the final published version.This paper addresses the theme of ‘widening student access, participation and lifelong learning’ within the wider issue of ‘measuring excellence’ in the UK higher education and finds them both to be problematic. An earlier paper entitled ‘Inclusion in an age of mobility’ (Traxler 2016) written over 4 years ago made the case that the inclusion agenda of the UK higher education of 1990s was largely a failure in its own terms but had in any case been made irrelevant by the subsequent onset of pervasive and ubiquitous connectivity and mobility, profoundly transforming the production, ownership, distribution and nature of learning and knowing and problematising the role and status of universities and lecturers.Published onlin

Postformal Education A Philosophy for Complex Futures

This book explains why the current education model, which was developed in the 19th century to meet the needs of industrial expansion, is obsolete

Understanding the Breadth of Futures Studies through a Dialogue with Climate Change

This article explores the breadth of the futures studies field by creating a dialogue with some prominent approaches to climate change. The first half of the article takes an evolutionary perspective on the development of the futures studies field. I show how developments in the field parallel the broader epistemological shift from the centrality of positivism to a plurality of postpositivist approaches particularly in the social sciences. Second, I explore the current scientific research on climate change including issues related to mitigation, adaptation, and coevolution. Finally, I apply my futures typology that includes five paradigmatic approaches to undertake a dialogue between futures studies and climate change. </jats:p