Trust Transfer in the Sharing Economy - A Survey-Based Approach

The sharing economy is experiencing explosive growth around the globe in which trust plays a crucial role and builds the foundation of the services. With the rise of the sharing economy and the increasing numbers of cross-contextual users, this research aims at the lack of trust transference possibilities across the Peer-to-Peer applications and has the goal to find out whether and how trust can be transferred between the platforms, so that new users do not have to create their reputation from scratch every time they join a new platform. First, this research provides an in-depth literature review of trust transfer theories. Secondly, a conceptual research model for the role of the imported trust in the context of the sharing economy is outlined and analysed by proposing and evaluating a questionnaire using structural equation modeling. Throughout the study, a three-dimensional scale of trust, i.e. ability, benevolence and integrity, is validated in the context of the sharing economy. The experimental study shows that both the overall and subdimensional trust in the provider is directly affected by the overall trust in the platform, the perceived reputation as well as the perceived social presence. The study also provides empirical evidence for the existence of trust transferability. The findings show that in addition to the immanent ratings, imported ratings also significantly affect the perceived reputation of the provider positively. Finally, this paper discusses further details of the trust transfer processes and broadens implications for future research. The sharing economy is experiencing explosive growth around the globe in which trust plays a crucial role and builds the foundation of the services. With the rise of the sharing economy and the increasing numbers of cross-contextual users, this research aims at the lack of trust transference possibilities across the Peer-to-Peer applications and has the goal to find out whether and how trust can be transferred between the platforms, so that new users do not have to create their reputation from scratch every time they join a new platform. First, this research provides an in-depth literature review of trust transfer theories. Secondly, a conceptual research model for the role of the imported trust in the context of the sharing economy is outlined and analysed by proposing and evaluating a questionnaire using structural equation modeling. Throughout the study, a three-dimensional scale of trust, i.e. ability, benevolence and integrity, is validated in the context of the sharing economy. The experimental study shows that both the overall and subdimensional trust in the provider is directly affected by the overall trust in the platform, the perceived reputation as well as the perceived social presence. The study also provides empirical evidence for the existence of trust transferability. The findings show that in addition to the immanent ratings, imported ratings also significantly affect the perceived reputation of the provider positively. Finally, this paper discusses further details of the trust transfer processes and broadens implications for future research.  Keywords: Sharing Economy, Trust, Trust Transfer, Reputation, Peer-to-pee

Chaperoning EF Hands that Shape Calcium Response: NCALD, HPCA and S100B

All organisms have an internal clock with a defined period between repetitions of activities. The period for circadian clock in human is 24.5 hours, while in mouse and rat, it is 23.5 hours. However, all organisms are forced to be in synchronization with their environment. A major environmental force that resets the internal clock to 24 hours is light. This phenomenon is defined as “light entrainment” or “phase-setting”. It is unclear how this entrainment process occurs. Studies from this laboratory indicate a role for two neuronal calcium sensor proteins: Neurocalcin (NCALD) and S100B. For these two genes, mRNA as well as protein levels exhibit a light-dependent variation, which is observed both in a cell line (derived from SCN progenitors) as well as selected tissues in rats and mice. We hypothesize that the two proteins interact with each other and their ability to translocate upon a spike in intracellular calcium is critical for their function. Here, we demonstrate that NCALD and S100B interact with each other both in vivo and in vitro. The interaction is likely modulated by free calcium concentrations under both conditions. We also demonstrate that the NCALD-S100B complex translocates to a peri-nuclear, vesicle-rich location upon histamine addition in COS7 cell line, whereas the S100B-S100B complex does not. The results suggest that NCALD serves as a calcium-dependent chaperone for S100B, enabling targeting of the complex to certain intracellular locations to accomplish different tasks

Study of the leaching of pentachlorophenol from treated utility poles

Pentachlorophenol ( PCP ) has been used as a preservative in wood industry over 40 years. If new regulations are passed, the disposal of used treated utility poles in landfills could be restricted because of the toxic properties of PCP. This study was undertaken to provide a better understanding of the rates and mechanisms of leaching of PCP from these poles. Following the initial analytical method development for PCP determination, a study was done to apply and validate the method in a leaching characteristics study of PCP from Douglas Fir and Southern Pine. The major factors which influence the leaching rate of PCP from wood were tested under laboratory conditions. The results show that pH is the most important among these factors. The leaching rate of PCP decreases linearly up to pH 5 then decreases in exponentially between pH 7 - pH 9. Increasing the temperature, volume or decreasing the ionic strength of leaching solution also increases the leaching rate of PCP from wood

Introduction of the World Organic Language Teaching Approach

This article introduces the OWL instructional approach including its rationale, target setting, procedure, and class structure. With the OWL experience, the author also gives reflections on this approach

MARACAS: a real-time multicore VCPU scheduling framework

This paper describes a multicore scheduling and load-balancing framework called MARACAS, to address shared cache and memory bus contention. It builds upon prior work centered around the concept of virtual CPU (VCPU) scheduling. Threads are associated with VCPUs that have periodically replenished time budgets. VCPUs are guaranteed to receive their periodic budgets even if they are migrated between cores. A load balancing algorithm ensures VCPUs are mapped to cores to fairly distribute surplus CPU cycles, after ensuring VCPU timing guarantees. MARACAS uses surplus cycles to throttle the execution of threads running on specific cores when memory contention exceeds a certain threshold. This enables threads on other cores to make better progress without interference from co-runners. Our scheduling framework features a novel memory-aware scheduling approach that uses performance counters to derive an average memory request latency. We show that latency-based memory throttling is more effective than rate-based memory access control in reducing bus contention. MARACAS also supports cache-aware scheduling and migration using page recoloring to improve performance isolation amongst VCPUs. Experiments show how MARACAS reduces multicore resource contention, leading to improved task progress.http://www.cs.bu.edu/fac/richwest/papers/rtss_2016.pdfAccepted manuscrip

Investigating Teenage Drivers\u27 Driving Behavior before and after LAG (Less Aggressive Goals) Training Program

Motor vehicle crashes are a leading cause of death during adolescence, with the fatal crash rate per mile-driven for 16-19 years old drivers being nearly 3 times larger than the rate for drivers age 20 and older. High gravitational events among teenage drivers, such as quick starts, and hard stops, have been shown to be highly correlated with crash rates. The current younger driver training programs developed in the late 1990s, however, do not appear to be especially effective in regard to many skills which are critical to avoiding crashes. With this in mind, a simulator-based training program aimed at reducing the behaviors that make quick accelerations unsafe and quick decelerations unnecessary was designed and evaluated. The training adopts the active training strategy which has been proven to be effective, and includes those scenarios in which teenage drivers are at highest risks. It is expected that drivers who receive the active training will drive more safely than drivers who receive the placebo training, in terms of eye scanning behaviors in scenarios where quick accelerations are necessary (e.g., how often they glance towards areas where threats could emerge), following behaviors in scenarios where a lead vehicle could stop suddenly (e.g., how much headway they allow between their vehicle and a lead vehicle), and vehicle behaviors such as speed, acceleration rate, deceleration rate and headway