Cultures within a culture: the role of nationality and religion for environmentally significant behaviour in students living in university accommodation

Reducing global warming cannot be achieved through technological interventions alone; it requires a change in human behaviour. Households are a major contributor to carbon emissions, and thus play an integral part in strategies aiming at a more sustainable living. Behaviour changes in the household can make a significant contribution towards reducing CO2 emissions. However, people vary strongly in their household practices; differences in behaviour account for a substantial amount of variance in heat, electricity, and water consumption (Gill et al., 2010). What causes these differences? In addition to age and education, nationality and religion play a role: They impact on physical aspects of well-being and on environmental attitudes (e.g., Isaacs et al., 2010; Guth et al., 1995). The physical aspect such as perception of warmth is of importance insofar as that comfort practices could influence on environmentally significant behaviour. The Eurobarometer 295 (2008), a study on the attitudes of European citizens towards the environment, also revealed differences in attitudes and behaviour of Europeans towards the environment. Therefore, steps to promote more sustainable living have to be adapted to different cultures. Rising globalization brings about more heterogeneous populations, meaning that there will be increasingly "cultures within a culture." An important question is what happens to cultural differences in environmentally significant behaviour in such a setting. It could be that differences are diluted by a largely shared environment, or that they continue to persist, thanks to being deeply rooted in one’s origin and to the non-shared part of the environment. Our study: The aim of this study was to examine the variation in pro-environmental attitudes, behaviour, and values in members of a community now living in a very similar setting but coming from diverse backgrounds. If personal background accounts for differences in the variables at stake, then this has important implications, e.g. for all national interventions launched to change behaviour. Data was collected through a web-based survey. The survey was sent out to first-year students living in university accommodation at the University of Greenwich. Religion, strength of religion, nationality, years living in the UK, program studied, gender and age were recorded and the impact of these variables on a variety of measures such as pro- environmental attitudes, values, and actual behaviour was assessed. Results are currently being analysed but preliminary data suggest that sub-culture does play a role and thus needs to be considered when developing carbon reduction interventions. The implications of these findings for the University and national policies are discussed

The characteristics of electronic training collars for dogs

A wide range of electronic dog training collars (e-collars) is available in the UK, yet there is no means by which purchasers can meaningfully compare their electrical characteristics at the point of sale. In this research the electrical characteristics of 13 models of e-collar were examined and an approach to ranking the strength of the electrical stimuli was developed. The electrical impedance of dogs’ necks was measured so that e-collars could be tested under realistic conditions. This impedance was found to be about 10kΩ for wet dogs and 640kΩ for dry dogs. Two copies of each of eight e-collar models and one copy of a further five models were tested. The stimuli generated by these collars comprised sequences of short high voltage pulses. There were large differences between e-collar models in the peak voltage, number of pulses and duration of the pulses but little variation between the duplicates. The peak voltage varied with the impedance of the dog, from 6000V at an impedance of 500kΩ to 100V at 5kΩ. The highest voltages were generated for only a few millionths of a second. A stimulus strength ranking index (SSRI) was developed based on the subjective response of human subjects to electrical stimuli. This index is used to compare the strength of e-collars with diverse electrical characteristics. It shows a wide range in the stimulus strengths of collars and that the relationships between ‘momentary’ and ‘continuous’ stimuli for various models differ significantly

Observation of narrow-band noise accompanying the breakdown of insulating states in high Landau levels

Recent magnetotransport experiments on high mobility two-dimensional electron systems have revealed many-body electron states unique to high Landau levels. Among these are re-entrant integer quantum Hall states which undergo sharp transitions to conduction above some threshold field. Here we report that these transitions are often accompanied by narrow- and broad-band noise with frequencies which are strongly dependent on the magnitude of the applied dc current.Comment: 4 pages, 3 figure

Metastable Resistance Anisotropy Orientation of Two-Dimensional Electrons in High Landau Levels

In half-filled high Landau levels, two-dimensional electron systems possess collective phases which exhibit a strongly anisotropic resistivity tensor. A weak, but as yet unknown, rotational symmetry-breaking potential native to the host semiconductor structure is necessary to orient these phases in macroscopic samples. Making use of the known external symmetry-breaking effect of an in-plane magnetic field, we find that the native potential can have two orthogonal local minima. It is possible to initialize the system in the higher minimum and then observe its relaxation toward equilibrium.Comment: 5 pages, 3 figures. Figure references corrected. Version accepted for publication in Physical Review Letter

Chaos in Time Dependent Variational Approximations to Quantum Dynamics

Dynamical chaos has recently been shown to exist in the Gaussian approximation in quantum mechanics and in the self-consistent mean field approach to studying the dynamics of quantum fields. In this study, we first show that any variational approximation to the dynamics of a quantum system based on the Dirac action principle leads to a classical Hamiltonian dynamics for the variational parameters. Since this Hamiltonian is generically nonlinear and nonintegrable, the dynamics thus generated can be chaotic, in distinction to the exact quantum evolution. We then restrict attention to a system of two biquadratically coupled quantum oscillators and study two variational schemes, the leading order large N (four canonical variables) and Hartree (six canonical variables) approximations. The chaos seen in the approximate dynamics is an artifact of the approximations: this is demonstrated by the fact that its onset occurs on the same characteristic time scale as the breakdown of the approximations when compared to numerical solutions of the time-dependent Schrodinger equation.Comment: 10 pages (12 figures), RevTeX (plus macro), uses epsf, minor typos correcte

Network meta-analysis of diagnostic test accuracy studies identifies and ranks the optimal diagnostic tests and thresholds for healthcare policy and decision making

Objective: Network meta-analyses have extensively been used to compare the effectiveness of multiple interventions for healthcare policy and decision-making. However, methods for evaluating the performance of multiple diagnostic tests are less established. In a decision-making context, we are often interested in comparing and ranking the performance of multiple diagnostic tests, at varying levels of test thresholds, in one simultaneous analysis. Study design and setting: Motivated by an example of cognitive impairment diagnosis following stroke, we synthesized data from 13 studies assessing the efficiency of two diagnostic tests: Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE) and Montreal Cognitive Assessment (MoCA), at two test thresholds: MMSE <25/30 and <27/30, and MoCA <22/30 and <26/30. Using Markov Chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) methods, we fitted a bivariate network meta-analysis model incorporating constraints on increasing test threshold, and accounting for the correlations between multiple test accuracy measures from the same study. Results: We developed and successfully fitted a model comparing multiple tests/threshold combinations while imposing threshold constraints. Using this model, we found that MoCA at threshold <26/30 appeared to have the best true positive rate, whilst MMSE at threshold <25/30 appeared to have the best true negative rate. Conclusion: The combined analysis of multiple tests at multiple thresholds allowed for more rigorous comparisons between competing diagnostics tests for decision making

Object-Oriented Paradigms for Modelling Vascular\ud Tumour Growth: a Case Study

Motivated by a family of related hybrid multiscale models, we have built an object-oriented framework for developing and implementing multiscale models of vascular tumour growth. The models are implemented in our framework as a case study to highlight how object-oriented programming techniques and good object-oriented design may be used effectively to develop hybrid multiscale models of vascular tumour growth. The intention is that this paper will serve as a useful reference for researchers modelling complex biological systems and that these researchers will employ some of the techniques presented herein in their own projects

Modelling the cost effectiveness of interferon beta and glatiramer acetate in the management of multiple sclerosis

OBJECTIVE: To evaluate the cost effectiveness of four disease modifying treatments (interferon betas and glatiramer acetate) for relapsing remitting and secondary progressive multiple sclerosis in the United Kingdom. DESIGN: Modelling cost effectiveness. SETTING: UK NHS. PARTICIPANTS: Patients with relapsing remitting multiple sclerosis and secondary progressive multiple sclerosis. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES: Cost per quality adjusted life year gained. RESULTS: The base case cost per quality adjusted life year gained by using any of the four treatments ranged from £42 000 ($66 469; 61 630) to £98 000 based on efficacy information in the public domain. Uncertainty analysis suggests that the probability of any of these treatments having a cost effectiveness better than £20 000 at 20 years is below 20%. The key determinants of cost effectiveness were the time horizon, the progression of patients after stopping treatment, differential discount rates, and the price of the treatments. CONCLUSIONS: Cost effectiveness varied markedly between the interventions. Uncertainty around point estimates was substantial. This uncertainty could be reduced by conducting research on the true magnitude of the effect of these drugs, the progression of patients after stopping treatment, the costs of care, and the quality of life of the patients. Price was the key modifiable determinant of the cost effectiveness of these treatments