Scarcity of female mates predicts regional variation in men’s and women’s sociosexual orientation across US states

Previous studies have linked regional variation in willingness to engage in uncommitted sexual relationships (i.e., sociosexual orientation) to many different socio-ecological measures, such as adult sex ratio, life expectancy, and gross domestic product. However, these studies share a number of potentially serious limitations, including reliance on a single dataset of responses aggregated by country and a failure to properly consider intercorrelations among different socio-ecological measures. We address these limitations by (1) collecting a new dataset of 4,453 American men’s and women’s sociosexual orientation scores, (2) using multilevel analyses to avoid aggregation, and (3) deriving orthogonal factors reflecting US state-level differences in the scarcity of female mates, environmental demands, and wealth. Analyses showed that the scarcity of female mates factor, but not the environmental demand or wealth factors, predicted men’s and women’s sociosexual orientation. Participants reported being less willing to engage in uncommitted sexual relationships when female mates were scarce. These results highlight the importance of scarcity of female mates for regional differences in men’s and women’s mating strategies. They also suggest that effects of wealth-related measures and environmental demands reported in previous research may be artifacts of intercorrelations among socio-ecological measures or, alternatively, do not necessarily generalize well to new datasets

No evidence for associations between men's salivary testosterone and responses on the Intrasexual Competitiveness Scale

Objectives: Many previous studies have investigated relationships between men’s competitiveness and testosterone. For example, the extent of changes in men’s testosterone levels following a competitive task predicts the likelihood of them choosing to compete again. Recent work investigating whether individual differences in men’s testosterone levels predict individual differences in their competitiveness have produced mixed results. Methods: In light of the above, we investigated whether men’s (N = 59) scores on the Intrasexual Competitiveness Scale were related to either within-subject changes or between-subject differences in men’s salivary testosterone levels. Results: Men’s responses on the Intrasexual Competitiveness Scale did not appear to track within-subject changes in testosterone. By contrast with one recent study, men’s Intrasexual Competitiveness Scale also did not appear to be related to individual differences in testosterone. Conclusions: Our results present no evidence for associations between men’s testosterone and their responses on the Intrasexual Competitiveness Scale

Does the interaction between cortisol and testosterone predict men's facial attractiveness?

Although some researchers have suggested that the interaction between cortisol and testosterone predicts ratings of men’s facial attractiveness, evidence for this pattern of results is equivocal. Consequently, the current study tested for a correlation between men’s facial attractiveness and the interaction between their cortisol and testosterone levels. We also tested for corresponding relationships between the interaction between cortisol and testosterone and ratings of men’s facial health and dominance (perceived traits that are correlated with facial attractiveness in men). We found no evidence that ratings of either facial attractiveness or health were correlated with the interaction between cortisol and testosterone. Some analyses suggested that the interaction between cortisol and testosterone levels may predict ratings of men’s facial dominance, however, with testosterone being more closely related to facial dominance ratings among men with higher cortisol. Our results suggest that the relationship between men’s facial attractiveness and the interaction between cortisol and testosterone is not robust

Performance of an externally triggered gravitational-wave burst search

We present the performance of searches for gravitational wave bursts associated with external astrophysical triggers as a function of the search sky region. We discuss both the case of Gaussian noise and real noise of gravitational wave detectors for arbitrary detector networks. We demonstrate the ability to reach Gaussian limited sensitivity in real non-Gaussian data, and show the conditions required to attain it. We find that a single sky position search is ~20% more sensitive than an all-sky search of the same data.Comment: 9 pages, 5 figures, accepted by PR

Geometry Modeling for Unstructured Mesh Adaptation

The quantification and control of discretization error is critical to obtaining reliable simulation results. Adaptive mesh techniques have the potential to automate discretization error control, but have made limited impact on production analysis workflow. Recent progress has matured a number of independent implementations of flow solvers, error estimation methods, and anisotropic mesh adaptation mechanics. However, the poor integration of initial mesh generation and adaptive mesh mechanics to typical sources of geometry has hindered adoption of adaptive mesh techniques, where these geometries are often created in Mechanical Computer- Aided Design (MCAD) systems. The difficulty of this coupling is compounded by two factors: the inherent complexity of the model (e.g., large range of scales, bodies in proximity, details not required for analysis) and unintended geometry construction artifacts (e.g., translation, uneven parameterization, degeneracy, self-intersection, sliver faces, gaps, large tolerances be- tween topological elements, local high curvature to enforce continuity). Manual preparation of geometry is commonly employed to enable fixed-grid and adaptive-grid workflows by reducing the severity and negative impacts of these construction artifacts, but manual process interaction inhibits workflow automation. Techniques to permit the use of complex geometry models and reduce the impact of geometry construction artifacts on unstructured grid workflows are models from the AIAA Sonic Boom and High Lift Prediction are shown to demonstrate the utility of the current approach

CMOS compatible athermal silicon microring resonators

Silicon photonics promises to alleviate the bandwidth bottleneck of modern day computing systems. But silicon photonic devices have the fundamental problem of being highly sensitive to ambient temperature fluctuations due to the high thermo-optic (TO) coefficient of silicon. Most of the approaches proposed to date to overcome this problem either require significant power consumption or incorporate materials which are not CMOS-compatible. Here we demonstrate a new class of optical devices which are passively temperature compensated, based on tailoring the optical mode confinement in silicon waveguides. We demonstrate the operation of a silicon photonic resonator over very wide temperature range of greater than 80 degrees. The fundamental principle behind this work can be extended to other photonic structures such as modulators, routers, switches and filters.Comment: 9 pages, 4 figure

A Generalized Stopping Criterion for Real-Time MPC with Guaranteed Stability

Most of the real-time implementations of the stabilizing optimal control actions suffer from the necessity to provide high computational effort. This paper presents a cutting-edge approach for real-time evaluation of linear-quadratic model predictive control (MPC) that employs a novel generalized stopping criterion, achieving asymptotic stability in the presence of input constraints. The proposed method evaluates a fixed number of iterations independent of the initial condition, eliminating the necessity for computationally expensive methods. We demonstrate the effectiveness of the introduced technique by its implementation of two widely-used first-order optimization methods: the projected gradient descent method (PGDM) and the alternating directions method of multipliers (ADMM). The numerical simulation confirmed a significantly reduced number of iterations, resulting in suboptimality rates of less than 2\,\%, while the effort reductions exceeded 80\,\%. These results nominate the proposed criterion for an efficient real-time implementation method of MPC controllers

Mobile Situated Language Learning

This deliverable D7.5.2 describes the work carried out in the scope of Task 7.5 “Mobile Situated Language Learning” of Work Package 7 “PERSUASIVE LEARNING SERVICES”. In deliverable D7.5.1, criteria were devised for the language learning material that would be produced for MASELTOV. These mobile-based resources have now been implemented (by replacement project partner, Pearson Publishing Ltd (PP)) and the way that they meet the criteria for the project is described here in detail. The lessons are based on topics that are common and relevant to immigrants and are structured in a way that fits into the ‘Incidental Learning Framework’ developed as part of Task 7.1. This service is also linked to other service in a way that allows indication of feedback and progress (integration with the MASELTOV User Profile), personalisation (integration with the Recommendation Service) and social interaction (integration with the MASELTOV discussion forum). The language lessons’ are linked to a user’s activity on MASELTOV via the Recommendation Service making learning contextually sensitive – that is, that it takes place in the same context in which it is applied. In conjunction with TextLens and social learning which takes place through predominantly the MASELTOV discussion forum, the learning tools provided in MASELTOV are both multi-sensory and contextually aware. As a replacement partner joining at the start of the final project year, PP has had to adapt and repond to the ideas on social/informal learning also outlined in deliverable D7.5.1. The way these criteria have been met is described here and also in the related deliverable D8.3.3. The sample language learning materials that were trialled in the project field trialled held in June 2014 were favourably received by participants