The Richness of Inner Experience: Relating Styles of Daydreaming to Creative Processes.

Psychologists have long hypothesized that daydreaming (i.e., engaging in stimulus-independent, task-unrelated thoughts and images) may facilitate creativity, but evidence for this hypothesis has been mixed. We propose that, to fully understand the relationship between daydreaming and creativity, it is essential to distinguish between different creative processes as well as between alternative styles of daydreaming. A prominent distinction in creativity research is that between analytic problem solving, which involves incremental and largely conscious processes, and insight, which is characterized by the spontaneity with which an idea springs to mind. In this aspect, insight resembles daydreaming. Indeed, recent evidence has linked daydreaming to creative performance. But like creativity, daydreaming is a multifaceted concept. Daydreams vary in style and content, a fact that is receiving little attention in contemporary research. Not all kinds of daydreaming are likely to have the same effects on creativity. We discuss different factors prevalent in people's daydreaming, such as mood, attentional focus, and intentionality, and consider how these factors may be related to creative processes. We further discuss implications for ways to enhance creativity through deliberate daydreaming practice

Mind wandering "Ahas" versus mindful reasoning: alternative routes to creative solutions.

Based on mixed results linking both mindfulness and its opposing construct mind wandering to enhanced creativity, we predicted that the relationship between mindfulness and creativity might depend on whether creative problems are approached through analytic strategy or through "insight" (i.e., sudden awareness of a solution). Study 1 investigated the relationship between trait mindfulness and compound remote associates problem solving as a function of participants' self-reported approach to each problem. The results revealed a negative relationship between mindfulness and problem-solving overall. However, more detailed analysis revealed that mindfulness was associated with impaired problem solving when approaching problems with insight, but increased problem solving when using analysis. In Study 2, we manipulated participants' problem-solving approach through instructions. We again found a negative relationship between mindfulness and creative performance in general, however, more mindful participants again performed better when instructed to approach problems analytically

Truth Talks: How North America’s Truth and Reconciliation Commissions Engage the Public in Change

Within the last 15 years, the first three Truth and Reconciliation Commissions (TRCs) in North America formed and completed their work. Patterned after similar efforts in South Africa, Latin America, and elsewhere, the TRCs in Greensboro, North Carolina; Maine; and Canada heard voluntarily-offered testimony from members of the general public and key parties to decades-long conflicts. The Commissions also evaluated responsibility for the conflicts and offered recommendations for change in their respective communities and countries, informed by the testimonies they received. This qualitative methods multiple case study of the three Commissions’ recommendations involved archival research and data analysis of testimony to the Commissions, alongside the subsequent recommendations made by those Commissions and any further policy measures taken by host governments in Greensboro, Maine, and Canada. The dissertation attempts to answer the research question: to what extent can truth and reconciliation commissions empower parties to long-running and wide-reaching conflicts to influence changes in their communities, states, or countries in ways courts cannot? Among the conclusions reached in this research is that TRCs integrated public testimony to a significant extent into their findings and recommendations, though the three governments in Greensboro, Maine, and Canada have implemented those recommendations with varying levels of commitment. This study can assist others tackling large-scale conflicts to consider how best to incorporate a truth and reconciliation commission into their efforts at healing and growth in their communities

The use of carbon dioxide for dislodging coal in mines

The coal mining industry prior to 1940, was undoubtedly facing a period when operating economies and efficient utilization of labor, machines and modern practices were more necessary than ever before. With its markets definitely threatened by other sources of heat and power produced with a minimum of labor, Coal had to exert every effort to secure the lowest possible production cost and also to produce a more satisfactory product with greater safety to men and mines...Many attempts have been, with various methods, to invent a method of breaking down coal that would fulfill the requirements stated above. In 1924 or 1925, three coal mining men of southern Illinois - a chemist, an electrical engineer and a mine operator - conceived the idea of a non-explosive cartridge utilizing the force of expanding carbon dioxide to break down coal at a working face. They sought a medium that would be as safe, or even safer, than permissible explosives, yet which would preserve the inherently firm structure of the coal and produce less fine coal than any other type of explosive...In 1927, the Safety Mining company was formed and took over all patents for the method. The trade name of CARDOX was given the method and further experimentation with cartridges, method of shooting and co-ordinating of mining methods with CARDOX shoot was carried on...This paper deals with an explanation of the theory and mechanics of the medium and the construction of the cartridge used in the CARDOX method. Some of the details of experimentation at Centralia and Zeigler, Illinois, and the system of cutting, drilling and shooting with CARDOX are explained. Also, the mine layout and method of distribution of shells and accounting on cartridges as used by the Bell & Zoller Coal and Mining company, at Zeigler, Illinois is herein dealt with, as well as a list of safety rules for handling CARDOX --Forward, page iii-v

Shade trees preserve avian insectivore biodiversity on coffee farms in a warming climate

Coffee is an important export in many developing countries, with a global annual trade value of $100 billion. Climate change is projected to drastically reduce the area where coffee is able to be grown. Shade trees may mitigate the effects of climate change through temperature regulation for coffee growth, temperature regulation for pest control, and increase in pest-eating bird diversity. The impact of shade on bird diversity and microclimate on coffee farms has been studied extensively in the Neotropics, but there is a dearth of research in the Paleotropics. I examined the local effects of shade on bird presence and temperature on coffee farms in Kenya and then created regional Maxent models for avian insectivores in East Africa. I adjusted current and future Bioclim layers based on mean differences in temperatures between shade and sun on coffee farms. I then projected models into the future and onto adjusted temperature layers to predict the impact of shade tree removal on climatic suitability for avian insectivores. I found that avian insectivore richness is projected to decrease significantly in the future, as is avian insectivore climatic suitability and suitable area, but shade trees on coffee farms can mediate this. Temperature is not currently a limiting factor for avian insectivores on Kenyan coffee farms, indicating that bird presence is determined by site-level factors. Future temperatures will become a regionally limiting factor for bird distribution in East Africa, but its effects can be potentially mediated through planting and maintaining shade trees on coffee farms

Native American College Student Transition Theory

This article explores the issues Native American college students face during their transition into higher education. Current student development theories do not fully capture the unique challenges and needs of the Native American population. A new perspective is offered by way of modifying aspects of existing theories, such as Chickering’s (1969) Identity Theory, Horse’s (2001) Perspective on American Indian Identity Development, and Schlossberg’s (1995) Transition Theory. The Native American College Student Transition Theory is a new model, which allows the student affairs professional to envision growth as would Native American culture—in a circular fashion. Six developmental stages were created to better represent the Native American student transition into higher education

Co-occurrence Patterns of Bat Flies on Neotropical Chiroptera

Parasite-host systems provide excellent opportunities to explore ecological dynamics such as competition, competitive exclusion, and co-occurrence. The distribution of streblid bat flies on their host bats were examined for patterns of species co-occurrence and to understand mechanisms driving these patterns. The purpose of this study was to determine patterns of co-occurrence among individuals of different Neotropical bat fly species. After establishing patterns of co-occurrence, tests on whether variation in fly morphology was linked to observed patterns of co-occurrence were performed. Co-occurrence patterns were determined using null model analyses, and a predominant pattern of aggregation was detected. To examine the relationship between co-occurrence and morphology, geometric morphometric analyses were performed to compare morphologies of co-occurring individuals of different species. Examination of ratios of species-pairs with significant differences in their morphology relative to speciespairs without significant differences resulted in both insight and more questions. Species segregation may result from morphological similarity between co-occurring streblid species, potentially reflecting historical niche overlap leading to competitive exclusion of one species from infesting the host individual. Aggregation of multiple streblid species however, does not appear to be due to differences in morphology. Results also indicate that explanations of co-occurrence patterns are not straightforward, and that multiple mechanisms may underlie patterns of co-occurrence. These results underscore important potential connections between morphology and patterns of co-occurrence, but future research is needed to verify these conclusions and examine other possible contributing mechanisms to patterns of co-occurrence in this biological system

Why Multicast Protocols (Don't) Scale: An Analysis of Multipoint Algorithms for Scalable Group Communication

With the exponential growth of the Internet, there is a critical need to design efficient, scalable and robust protocols to support the network infrastructure. A new class of protocols has emerged to address these challenges, and these protocols rely on a few key techniques, or micro-algorithms, to achieve scalability. By scalability, we mean the ability of groups of communicating processes to grow very large in size. We study the behavior of several of these fundamental techniques that appear in many deployed and emerging Internet standards: Suppression, Announce-Listen, and Leader Election. These algorithms are based on the principle of efficient multipoint communication, often in combination with periodic messaging. We assume a loosely-coupled communication model, where acknowledged messaging among groups of processes is not required. Thus, processes infer information from the periodic receipt or loss of messages from other processes. We present an analysis, validated by simulation, of the performance tradeoffs of each of these techniques. Toward this end, we derive a series of performance metrics that help us to evaluate these algorithms under lossy conditions: expected response time, network usage, memory overhead, consistency attainable, and convergence time. In addition, we study the impact of both correlated and uncorrelated loss on groups of communicating processes. As a result, this thesis provides insights into the scalability of multicast protocols that rely upon these techniques. We provide a systematic framework for calibrating as well as predicting protocol behavior over a range of operating conditions. In the process, we establish a general methodology for the analysis of these and other scalability techniques. Finally, we explore a theory of composition; if we understand the behavior of these micro-algorithms, then we can bound analytically the performance of the more complex algorithms that rely upon them