Sensing the Urban Interior

Following the principle of “spatial inversion” (Attiwill, 2011), whereby spaces between buildings habitually referred to as exteriors become interiors, this paper presents the background research, methodology and key findings from a case study framed as a perceptual documentation of an urban interior, the More London Estate, a riverside business development in London, England. The location sits at the boundaries between inside and outside, private and public, enclosed and open space. This distinctive position and promise of interiority makes it an ideal site of enquiry. The objective of the research is to uncover connections between the way we feel and our sense of belonging by investigating the correlation between the site’s embodied atmosphere and its perceptual affect on the body. The methodology is inspired by Peter Zumthor’s (2006) writings on atmospheres, James J. Gibson’s (1966, 1986) studies of ecology and perceptual systems, and Joy Monice Malnar and Frank Vodvarka’s (2004) work on sensory design. Key findings reveal a duality in existing perceptual narratives, and the recognition of the way the urban interior resonates with our senses provides a framework for reflection and an incentive towards sensory transformations

Re-imaging the Environment

This paper represents a study of selected visualisation and investigative methods that facilitate the exploration and expression of human emotions and perceptions within real world environments during the design development stages of a project, repositioning exploration and visualisation in spatial design education. It puts forward an outline for an iterative enquiry around human experiences in order to assess the value of alternative cognitive tools for spatial design students in higher education. Established tools such as orthographic drawings, axonometric projections or scale models equip spatial designers with the consistency they need to investigate and represent physical attributes of space but don't always constitute the best methods to explore the perceived environment, even though it is a key contributing factor to the way we experience our surroundings. It is therefore in the interest of design educators to investigate complementary interpretations that enable students to consciously explore less tangible aspects of design such as emotions and multi-sensorial modalities. Projects developed using tools and techniques ranging from digital 2D and 3D image making, photography, film, animation and performance provide an insight into the possibilities offered by exisiting visual technologies as dynamic study devices of human experiences and contribute to the generation of alternative processes in spatial design education

Dual Enrollment: An Instructor's Perspective

This paper addresses common arguments for and against dual enrollment from an instructor's perspective. Teaching college classes in a high school setting can present challenges for both students and their instructors; the paper focuses on frequent issues that occur and proposes solutions to ease the transition process. Evidence is also presented to answer the criticism that high school students are unprepared for college work; results from several dual enrollment Economics courses confirm that these students can not only succeed at the college level while still in high school, but in many cases outperform students in the traditional classroom.

An energy-saving development initiative increases birth rate and childhood malnutrition in rural Ethiopia

Background: Evolutionary life history theory predicts that, in the absence of contraception, any enhancement of maternal condition can increase human fertility. Energetic trade-offs are likely to be resolved in favour of maximizing reproductive success rather than health or longevity. Here we find support for the hypothesis that development initiatives designed to improve maternal and child welfare may also incur costs associated with increased family sizes if they do not include a family planning component. Methods and Findings: Demographic and anthropometric data were collected in a rural Ethiopian community benefiting from a recent labour-saving development technology that reduces women's energetic expenditure (n = 1,976 households). Using logistic hazards models and general linear modelling techniques, we found that whilst infant mortality has declined, the birth rate has increased, causing greater scarcity of resources within households. Conclusions: This study is, to our knowledge, the first to demonstrate a link between a technological development intervention and an increase in both birth rate and childhood malnutrition. Women's nutritional status was not improved by the energy-saving technology, because energy was diverted into higher birth rates. We argue that the contribution of biological processes to increased birth rates in areas of the developing world without access to modern contraception has been overlooked. This highlights the continued need for development programmes to be multisectoral, including access to and promotion of contraception

Phylogenetic analysis of the evolution of lactose digestion in adults

In most of the world's population the ability to digest lactose declines sharply after infancy, High lactose digestion capacity in adults is common only in populations of European and circum-Mediterranean origin and is thought to be an evolutionary adaptation to millennia of drinking milk from domestic livestock, Milk can also be consumed in a processed form, such as cheese or soured milk, which has a reduced lactose content, Two other selective pressures for drinking fresh milk with a high lactose content have been proposed: promotion of calcium uptake in high-latitude populations prone to vitamin-D deficiency and maintainance of water and electrolytes in the body in highly arid environments, These three hypotheses are all supported by the geographic distribution of high lactose digestion capacity in adults. However, the relationships between environmental variables and adult lactose digestion capacity are highly confounded by the shared ancestry of many populations whose lactose digestion capacity has been tested, The three hypotheses for the evolution of high adult lactose digestion capacity are tested here using a comparative method of analysis that takes the problem of phylogenetic confounding into account, This analysis supports the hypothesis that high adult lactose digestion capacity is an adaptation to dairying but does not support the hypotheses that lactose digestion capacity is additionally selected for either at high latitudes or in highly arid environments. Furthermore, methods using maximum likelihood are used to show that the evolution of milking preceded the evolution of high lactose digestion

Social network- and community-level influences on contraceptive use: evidence from rural Poland.

The diffusion of 'modern' contraceptives-as a proxy for the spread of low-fertility norms-has long interested researchers wishing to understand global fertility decline. A fundamental question is how local cultural norms and other people's behaviour influence the probability of contraceptive use, independent of women's socioeconomic and life-history characteristics. However, few studies have combined data at individual, social network and community levels to simultaneously capture multiple levels of influence. Fewer still have tested if the same predictors matter for different contraceptive types. Here, we use new data from 22 high-fertility communities in Poland to compare predictors of the use of (i) any contraceptives-a proxy for the decision to control fertility-with those of (ii) 'artificial' contraceptives-a subset of more culturally taboo methods. We find that the contraceptive behaviour of friends and family is more influential than are women's own characteristics and that community level characteristics additionally influence contraceptive use. Highly educated neighbours accelerate women's contraceptive use overall, but not their artificial method use. Highly religious neighbours slow women's artificial method use, but not their contraceptive use overall. Our results highlight different dimensions of sociocultural influence on contraceptive diffusion and suggest that these may be more influential than are individual characteristics. A comparative multilevel framework is needed to understand these dynamics

Evolution of Cultural Traits Occurs at Similar Relative Rates in Different World Regions

A fundamental issue in understanding human diversity is whether or not there are regular patterns and processes involved in cultural change. Theoretical and mathematical models of cultural evolution have been developed and are increasingly being used and assessed in empirical analyses. Here we test the hypothesis that the rates of change of features of human socio-cultural organization are governed by general rules. One prediction of this hypothesis is that different cultural traits will tend to evolve at similar relative rates in different world regions, despite the unique historical backgrounds of groups inhabiting these regions. We used phylogenetic comparative methods and systematic cross-cultural data to assess how different socio-cultural traits changed in 1) island Southeast Asia and the Pacific, and 2) sub-Saharan Africa. The relative rates of change in these two regions are significantly correlated. Furthermore, cultural traits that are more directly related to external environmental conditions evolve more slowly than traits related to social structures. This is consistent with the idea that a form of purifying selection is acting with greater strength on these more environmentally-linked traits. These results suggest that despite contingent historical events and the role of humans as active agents in the historical process, culture does indeed evolve in ways that can be predicted from general principles