376 research outputs found
Studies on Critical Thinking for Environmental Ethics
This study examined the role of critical thinking in regards to environmental ethical issues. First, an instrument was developed and validated to quantitatively measure students’ ability to apply critical thinking skills to various environmental ethical issues. Next, the instrument and a qualitative assessment were used to examine critical thinking capabilities of freshmen upon entry to a large introductory course. Last, the Environmental Ethics Critical Thinking Assessment, in conjunction with the qualitative assessment, were used to examine the change in critical thinking ability of all students in a large introductory course from pre to post-semester. In both studies, numerous antecedents to critical thinking were examined including critical thinking disposition, age, major, gender, previous courses taken on related subjects, self-rated strength of views, and self-rated leadership. Overall, students exhibited low levels of critical thinking. Both studies found gender and critical thinking disposition significant predictors of critical thinking skills. Qualitative analysis indicates that students improved their use of summarizing an author’s ideas in their own words, providing an example to help explain, comparing and contrasting diverging ideas, analyzing the structure of an argument, deriving plausible conclusions, discussing possible consequences, giving reasons to accept a claim, reflecting upon their own thinking, and identifying personal biases. However, all improvements were minimal and a large majority of students did not improve their use of critical thinking skills on a written assignment from pre to post-semester.
Advisor: Gina Matki
Adult Initiated Transition of Students with Autism and Self-Injurious Behavior
The purpose of this study was to discover if adult initiated transitions from center to center cause students with Autism self-injurious behavior. An ABC chart was used to gather data based on how many times the student inflicts self-harm upon himself, and what time of the day the self-injurious behavior occurs. With the data that was gathered on the student it was noticed that the most self-injurious behavior occurred when the student had to leave one center provided with adult initiation, and when he did not want to leave the activity of choice. As the behavior came more problematic, interventions were implemented to alleviate the self-injurious behavior. Such interventions were used as the countdown method, and saying hands-down when the behavior was occurring. The interventions decreased the behavior over time and the self-injurious became less prevalent
Can Facebook Aid Sustainability? An Investigation of Empathy Expression within the \u3cem\u3eHumans of New York\u3c/em\u3e Blog
This qualitative study offers a novel exploration of the links between social media, virtual intergroup contact, and empathy by examining how empathy is expressed through interactions on a popular social media blog. Global leaders are encouraging individuals to engage in behaviors and support policies that provide basic social foundations. It is difficult to motivate people to undertake such actions. However, research shows that empathy intensifies motivation to help others. It can cause individuals to see the world from the perspective of stigmatized group members and increase positive feelings. Social media offers a new pathway for virtual intergroup contact, providing opportunities to increase conversation about disadvantaged others and empathy. We examined expressions of empathy within a popular blog, Humans of New York (HONY), and engaged in purposeful case selection by focusing on (1) events where specific prosocial action was taken corresponding to interactions on the HONY blog and (2) presentation of people in countries other than the United States. Nine overarching themes; (1) perspective taking, (2) fantasy, (3) empathic concern, (4) personal distress, (5) relatability, (6) prosocial action, (7) community appreciation, (8) anti-empathy, and (9) rejection of anti-empathy, exemplify how the HONY community expresses and shares empathic thoughts and feelings
Basin bifurcations, oscillatory instability and rate-induced thresholds for AMOC in a global oceanic box model
The Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC) transports substantial
amounts of heat into the North Atlantic sector, and hence is of very high
importance in regional climate projections. The AMOC has been observed to show
multi-stability across a range of models of different complexity. The simplest
models find a bifurcation associated with the AMOC `on' state losing stability
that is a saddle node. Here we study a physically derived global oceanic model
of Wood {\em et al} with five boxes, that is calibrated to runs of the FAMOUS
coupled atmosphere-ocean general circulation model. We find the loss of
stability of the `on' state is due to a subcritical Hopf for parameters from
both pre-industrial and doubled CO atmospheres. This loss of stability
via subcritical Hopf bifurcation has important consequences for the behaviour
of the basin of attraction close to bifurcation. We consider various
time-dependent profiles of freshwater forcing to the system, and find that
rate-induced thresholds for tipping can appear, even for perturbations that do
not cross the bifurcation. Understanding how such state transitions occur is
important in determining allowable safe climate change mitigation pathways to
avoid collapse of the AMOC.Comment: 18 figure
The Mid-Pleistocene Transition induced by delayed feedback and bistability
The Mid-Pleistocene Transition, the shift from 41 kyr to 100 kyr
glacial-interglacial cycles that occurred roughly 1 Myr ago, is often
considered as a change in internal climate dynamics. Here we revisit the model
of Quaternary climate dynamics that was proposed by Saltzman and Maasch (1988).
We show that it is quantitatively similar to a scalar equation for the ice
dynamics only when combining the remaining components into a single delayed
feedback term. The delay is the sum of the internal times scales of ocean
transport and ice sheet dynamics, which is on the order of 10 kyr. We find
that, in the absence of astronomical forcing, the delayed feedback leads to
bistable behaviour, where stable large-amplitude oscillations of ice volume and
an equilibrium coexist over a large range of values for the delay. We then
apply astronomical forcing. We perform a systematic study to show how the
system response depends on the forcing amplitude. We find that over a wide
range of forcing amplitudes the forcing leads to a switch from small-scale
oscillations of 41 kyr to large-amplitude oscillations of roughly 100 kyr
without any change of other parameters. The transition in the forced model
consistently occurs near the time of the Mid-Pleistocene Transition as observed
in data records. This provides evidence that the MPT could have been primarily
a forcing-induced switch between attractors of the internal dynamics. Small
additional random disturbances make the forcing-induced transition near 800 kyr
BP even more robust. We also find that the forced system forgets its initial
history during the small-scale oscillations, in particular, nearby initial
conditions converge prior to transitioning. In contrast to this, in the regime
of large-amplitude oscillations, the oscillation phase is very sensitive to
random perturbations, which has a strong effect on the timing of the
deglaciation events
Derivation of Delay Equation Climate Models Using the Mori-Zwanzig Formalism
Models incorporating delay have been frequently used to understand climate
variability phenomena, but often the delay is introduced through an ad-hoc
physical reasoning, such as the propagation time of waves. In this paper, the
Mori-Zwanzig formalism is introduced as a way to systematically derive delay
models from systems of partial differential equations and hence provides a
better justification for using these delay-type models. The Mori-Zwanzig
technique gives a formal rewriting of the system using a projection onto a set
of resolved variables, where the rewritten system contains a memory term. The
computation of this memory term requires solving the orthogonal dynamics
equation, which represents the unresolved dynamics. For nonlinear systems, it
is often not possible to obtain an analytical solution to the orthogonal
dynamics and an approximate solution needs to be found. Here, we demonstrate
the Mori-Zwanzig technique for a two-strip model of the El Nino Southern
Oscillation (ENSO) and explore methods to solve the orthogonal dynamics. The
resulting nonlinear delay model contains an additional term compared to
previously proposed ad-hoc conceptual models. This new term leads to a larger
ENSO period, which is closer to that seen in observations.Comment: Submitted to Proceedings of the Royal Society A, 25 pages, 10 figure
TrackMapper Rises
This project repaired and upgraded non-functional Department of Agriculture and Fisheries (DAF) TrackMapper software, to a faster, functional, user-friendly, web-based application that can be directly accessed by researchers, fishery managers and others.
TrackMapper is database software that was developed by DAF researchers in 2007 as part of an externally funded Fisheries Research and Development Corporation project (FRDC project 2002/056 Innovative stock assessment and effort mapping using VMS and electronic logbooks). However, over the last 5-6 years, the program has become incompatible with contemporary Windows-based operating platforms, rendering it inoperable.
TrackMapper was developed for the Queensland east coast otter trawl fishery, which is the state’s most valuable commercial fishery, harvesting 7000-8000 t of seafood annually valued at $80-90 million. The most useful feature of TrackMapper is that it can produce maps of fishing effort, catch and catch rates for the fishery at a spatial resolution that is 10-50 times that reported using logbook data alone.
This information can be used for a range of fisheries management and research tasks, including the assessment of targeted stocks of prawns, scallops, bugs and stout whiting, as well as impacts on the bottom and other non-target bycatch species. This is noteworthy as much of the fishery occurs in waters of the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park (GBRMP), which has World Heritage status
The State of Global Air Quality Funding 2022
The only global snapshot of clean air funding from donor governments and philanthropic foundations. This report highlights funding trends and gaps in 2015-2021, as well as recommendations for smarter investment for people and planet.99% of the world's population breathes air that exceeds World Health Organization air quality guidelines. Cleaning the air is a massive opportunity to improve public health and climate change. Because air pollution and climate change are mainly caused by burning fossil fuels, these problems can be tackled together. By addressing these issues in isolation, funders and policymakers drastically overlook the potential of clean air to realise multiple health, social and sustainable economic benefits.Our fourth annual report is the only global snapshot of projects funded by international development funders and philanthropic foundations to tackle air pollution. We identify gaps in funding, and opportunities for strategic investment and collaboration for systemic change.?As the world prepares for COP27 in Egypt, we call for more joined up policies and funding to address air pollution, climate change and unsustainable economic growth simultaneously. This report provides recommendations for decision makers, policy makers and philanthropic foundations
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