Smelly Maps: The Digital Life of Urban Smellscapes

Smell has a huge influence over how we perceive places. Despite its importance, smell has been crucially overlooked by urban planners and scientists alike, not least because it is difficult to record and analyze at scale. One of the authors of this paper has ventured out in the urban world and conducted smellwalks in a variety of cities: participants were exposed to a range of different smellscapes and asked to record their experiences. As a result, smell-related words have been collected and classified, creating the first dictionary for urban smell. Here we explore the possibility of using social media data to reliably map the smells of entire cities. To this end, for both Barcelona and London, we collect geo-referenced picture tags from Flickr and Instagram, and geo-referenced tweets from Twitter. We match those tags and tweets with the words in the smell dictionary. We find that smell-related words are best classified in ten categories. We also find that specific categories (e.g., industry, transport, cleaning) correlate with governmental air quality indicators, adding validity to our study.Comment: 11 pages, 7 figures, Proceedings of 9th International AAAI Conference on Web and Social Media (ICWSM2015

Selves creating stories creating selves: A process model of self development

This article is focused on the growing empirical emphasis on connections between narrative and self-development. The authors propose a process model of self-development in which storytelling is at the heart of both stability and change in the self. Specifically, we focus on how situated stories help develop and maintain the self with reciprocal impacts on enduring aspects of self, specifically self-concept and the life story. This article emphasizes the research that has shown how autobiographical stories affect the self and provides a direction for future work to maximize the potential of narrative approaches to studying processes of self-development. Keywords: self; identity; narrative; autobiographical memory The universe is made up of stories, not of atoms. —Rukeyser (1968) This excerpt from Rukeyser’s poem suggests that, as humans, our worlds are stories; we are made up of, engage in, and are surrounded by stories. The importance of stories is a proposition that is gaining prominence in empirical psychology, and we build on this trend by proposing a process model of narrative selfdevelopment that has at its heart the study of personal autobiographical narratives, or situated stories. We use the term situated stories to emphasize the fact that any narrative account of personal memory is created within a specific situation, by particular individuals, for particular audiences, and to fulfill particular goals. These facts about situated stories provide the backdrop for our major proposition, which is that situated stories are used to develop and maintain the self. We view self-development through situated stories as a lifespan process, beginning in early childhood and extending to old age, and that process is situated in a larger cultural milieu that holds expectations of what makes a healthy narrative and a healthy self. The ideas that stories and self are intimatel

Energy Return Characteristics of EVA and E-TPU Midsoles During a Drop Jump

Expanded Thermoplastic Polyurethane (E-TPU) is a material used in shoe midsoles that has been described as having greater energy return than traditional Ethylene Vinyl-Acetate (EVA) midsole material. PURPOSE: The purpose of this study was to compare the landing and energy return characteristics of shoes using EVA and E-TPU midsoles. METHODS: Ten collegiate female athletes (19.7±1.0 yrs, 75.74±10.9 kg, 1.72±0.08 m) volunteered and provided informed consent to participate in this study. Participants performed five drop jumps from a height of 50 cm under two conditions; while wearing EVA midsole shoes and while wearing E-TPU midsole shoes. Peak force, rate of loading and impulse were measured from a Bertec force plate sampled at 1000 Hz during the initial landing phase of the drop jump. Coefficient of Restitution (COR) was determined by measuring the bounce height of a 1 in steel ball bearing dropped from a 1 m height onto the shoes. All measures were compared between midsole conditions using paired t-tests. RESULTS: Peak vertical force when landing with the EVA shoe (3265.6±554.2 N) was not different (p=0.19) than when landing with the E-TPU shoe (3406.6± 590.3 N). Similar rates of loading (p=0.71) were found for the EVA shoes (56106.3±9995.8 N/s) and the E-TPU shoes (54232.4±12167.0). Likewise impulse was not different (p=0.30) between the EVA shoe (710.5±177.7 Ns) and E-TPU shoe (693.9±162.6 Ns). However, COR was slightly higher (p=0.01) in the E-TPU shoe (0.67±.05) than the EVA shoe (0.66±0.02). CONCLUSION: The difference in COR values coupled with the similar landing characteristics observed for the different midsole materials may suggest that individuals are able to compensate for material differences by using different physiological strategies such as using different muscle stiffness during the landing phase depending on midsole material. Further testing to examine physiological measures during these movements is warranted

Recent advances in smellscape research for the built environment.

The interrelationships between humans, smells and the built environment have been the focus of increasing numbers of research studies in the past ten years. This paper reviews these trends and identifies the challenges in smellscape research from three aspects: methodological approaches, artistic design interventions and museum practices, and odour policy making. In response to the gaps and challenges identified, three areas of future research have also been identified for this field: smell archives and databases, social justice within odour control and management, and research into advanced building materials. [Abstract copyright: Copyright © 2021 Xiao, Aletta, Radicchi, McLean, Shiner and Verbeek.

Understanding Opioid Users’ Views on Fentanyl could help Reduce Overdoses

The opioid overdose crisis is a national public health emergency, made much worse in recent years by the widespread emergence of fentanyl – a highly potent synthetic opioid. This research brief summarizes the findings from their research conducted in southwestern Pennsylvania in 2017 and 2018. Results show that the majority of interviewees who use opioids are fearful of and want to avoid fentanyl and would utilize harm reduction strategies such as fentanyl test strips if they were made more widely available

Speech rhythm auto-recurrence is negatively linked to quality of mental-health counseling interactions

We explored use of Recurrence Quantification Analysis (RQA) of speech rhythm data from mental-health counseling sessions for prediction of quality of psychotherapy. Time-series of inter-syllable intervals (ISIs) were extracted from 239 counseling sessions conducted by 12 therapists who repeatedly interacted with 30 clients. We found a negative association between recurrence metrics and client-rated session quality and a negative link between percent of laminarity and therapist-rated session quality, after controlling for self-reported client depression and distress measures and duration of speech sound within a session. Placing value on reduced recurrence in patterns of ISIs, and especially reduced degree of a dyadic system remaining in the same speech-rhythm pattern may be indicative of a desire for variation in content and strategies of client-therapist interaction. These exploratory findings point to the possibility of RQA-based automated systems to capture the ‘footprint’ of the non-verbal dynamic that is indicative of successful mental-health counseling

Reported behavioural differences between geldings and mares challenge sex-driven stereotypes in ridden equine behaviour

© 2020 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. Horse trainers and riders may have preconceived ideas of horse temperament based solely on the sex of the horse. A study (n = 1233) of horse enthusiasts (75% of whom had more than 8 years of riding experience) revealed that riders prefer geldings over mares and stallions. While these data may reflect different sex preferences in horses used for sport, they may also reduce the chances of some horses reaching their performance potential. Further, an unfounded sex prejudice is likely to contribute to unconscious bias when perceiving unwanted behaviours, simplistically attributing them to demographic characteristics rather than more complex legacies of training and prior learning. The current study analysed reported sex-related behavioural differences in ridden and non-ridden horses using data from responses to the pilot study of the Equine Behaviour Assessment and Research Questionnaire (E-BARQ) survey. Respondents (n = 1233) reported on the behaviour of their horse using a 151-item questionnaire. Data were searched for responses relating to mares and geldings, and 110 traits with the greatest percentage difference scores between mares and geldings were selected were tested for univariate significance at p < 0.2. Multivariable modelling of the effect of sex (mare or gelding) on remaining traits was assessed by ordinal logistic regression, using a cumulative proportional log odds model. Results revealed mares were significantly more likely to move away when being caught compared to geldings (p = 0.003). Geldings were significantly more likely to chew on lead ropes when tied (p = 0.003) and to chew on rugs (p = 0.024). However, despite sex-related differences in these non-ridden behaviours, there was no evidence of any significant sex-related differences in the behaviours of the horses when ridden. This finding suggests that ridden horse behaviour is not sexually dimorphic or that particular horse sports variously favour one sex over another

Reported Behavioural Differences between Geldings and Mares Challenge Sex-Driven Stereotypes in Ridden Equine Behaviour

Horse trainers and riders may have preconceived ideas of horse temperament based solely on the sex of the horse. A study (n = 1233) of horse enthusiasts (75% of whom had more than 8 years of riding experience) revealed that riders prefer geldings over mares and stallions. While these data may reflect different sex preferences in horses used for sport, they may also reduce the chances of some horses reaching their performance potential. Further, an unfounded sex prejudice is likely to contribute to unconscious bias when perceiving unwanted behaviours, simplistically attributing them to demographic characteristics rather than more complex legacies of training and prior learning. The current study analysed reported sex-related behavioural differences in ridden and non-ridden horses using data from responses to the pilot study of the Equine Behaviour Assessment and Research Questionnaire (E-BARQ) survey. Respondents (n = 1233) reported on the behaviour of their horse using a 151-item questionnaire. Data were searched for responses relating to mares and geldings, and 110 traits with the greatest percentage difference scores between mares and geldings were selected were tested for univariate significance at p \u3c 0.2. Multivariable modelling of the effect of sex (mare or gelding) on remaining traits was assessed by ordinal logistic regression, using a cumulative proportional log odds model. Results revealed mares were significantly more likely to move away when being caught compared to geldings (p = 0.003). Geldings were significantly more likely to chew on lead ropes when tied (p = 0.003) and to chew on rugs (p = 0.024). However, despite sex-related differences in these non-ridden behaviours, there was no evidence of any significant sex-related differences in the behaviours of the horses when ridden. This finding suggests that ridden horse behaviour is not sexually dimorphic or that particular horse sports variously favour one sex over another