Peer Pressure, Incentives, and Gender: an Experimental Analysis of Motivation in the Workplace

We present results from a real-effort experiment, simulating actual work-place conditions, comparing the productivity of workers under fixed wages and piece rates. Workers, who were paid to enter data, were exposed to different degrees of peer pressure under both payment systems. The peer pressure was generated in the form of private information about the productivity of their peers. We have two main results. First, we find no level of peer pressure for which the productivity of either male or female workers is significantly higher than productivity without peer pressure. Second, we find that very low and very high levels of peer pressure can significantly decrease productivity (particularly for men paid fixed wages). These results are consistent with models of conformism and self-motivation.Peer effects, fixed wages, piece rates, gender

Droplets: geo-located audio as a social media platform

Location-based audio has previously attracted some attention from the HCI community. This has mainly revolved around knowledge-sharing and creation of curated experiences as artistic expression. In this paper we present initial work in which we look at located audio through the lenses of social media, and present initial work on a social media app--Droplets--which seeks to create new geo-located social media experiences

Peer pressure, incentives, and gender: an experimental analysis of motivation in the workplace

We present results from a real-effort experiment, simulating actual work-place conditions, comparing the productivity of workers under fixed wages and piece rates. Workers, who were paid to enter data, were exposed to different degrees of peer pressure under both payment systems. The peer pressure was generated in the form of private information about the productivity of their peers. We have two main results. First, we find no level of peer pressure for which the productivity of either male or female workers is significantly higher than productivity without peer pressure. Second, we find that very low and very high levels of peer pressure can significantly decrease productivity (particularly for men paid fixed wages). These results are consistent with models of conformism and self-motivation

Expression in the human brain of retinoic acid induced 1, a protein associated with neurobehavioural disorders

Acknowledgements Funding was provided by the Wellcome Trust and Tenovus Scotland. Prof Fragoso is the recipient of a Post Doctoral Science without Borders grant from the Brazilian National Council for Scientific and Technological Development (CNPq, 37450/2012- 7). We also thank Aberdeen Proteomics for assistance with the western blots as well as the Microscopy and Histology Core Facility at the University of Aberdeen for confocal microscopy.Peer reviewedPublisher PD

Synthetic character fidelity through non-verbal behaviour in computer games

Artificial Intelligence in games has historically focused on providing a challenging opponent for a player and narrative development. Scope exists to increase the fidelity of synthetic characters throughout the game to create a more immersive game play experience. This requires both visual and behavioural fidelity, and while graphics are nearing photorealism, synthetic characters' behaviour is still unrealistic. Non-verbal behaviour of synthetic characters has to date received little attention and so the scope and participants of non-verbal behaviour requires identification. We review the range of spatial and task scenarios relevant in a game context, then identify categories of non-verbal behaviour and go on tot summarise their role in communication and propose their incorporation in the design of non-player characters. Finally we review how non-verbal behaviour of synthetic agents might increase immersion for a player and identify interaction techniques that might facilitate non-verbal communication with players and non-players characters alike

The impact of influenza on the behaviour of lung basal cells

Influenza is the cause of 5 million infections globally, resulting in around 500,000 deaths each year. Despite targeted anti-viral drugs and vaccines, influenza viruses are poorly controlled and pose a particular threat to those who suffer chronic diseases. During infection, virus and immune-mediated damage destroys the airway structure needed for gas exchange and repairing this damage is essential for survival. Lung repair is driven by activation of progenitor cells, but how they carry out this repair is not well understood. Lung progenitors are difficult to study as they are a rare cell type in the lung, and the protocols for lung digest are not optimised for recovery of progenitors. We developed a new protocol for increasing the yield of progenitors from mouse lung tissue and used published transcriptomics data sets to identify progenitor cells in silico. We aimed to understand how the composition of the lung was changed during damage, so we infected mice with influenza A virus and studied how the behaviour of the epithelial progenitors changed. We found the composition of the lung changes during the peak and recovery phases of influenza. This change in composition correlates with increased activation and proliferation of progenitors and we show that this is accompanied by a change in cell metabolism, particularly an increase in glycolysis. We found that upper airway basal cells rely on IL-10 signalling to initiate this activation, and we suggest that the immunoregulatory response is necessary to initiate basal cell activation. We considered that lung basal cells might be changed by direct interaction with influenza viruses and using novel, fluorescent influenza A virus, we show that a subset of lung basal cells are directly infected by influenza virus but survive. Direct infection triggers an increase in stress, and further increases in glycolytic metabolism. We suggest this metabolic adaption of epithelial progenitors is a critical step in initiating lung repair after damage, and the stress seen in directly infected cells could result in improper dysplastic repair. Our data support the proposal that new treatments for respiratory diseases could consider targeting mechanisms of repair. Improving how the host repairs damage could not only be effective alongside drugs and vaccines in treating acute infections like influenza, but also in resolving chronic inflammatory such as COPD

Composing for the interactive medium

We present a discussion of the role of the composer when developing content for the composer when developing content for the interactive, participatory medium. We describe compositional tensions which emerged during the creation and enactment of our interactive performance, humanaquarium, and discuss how the intertwined nature of interactive and aesthetic concerns inspired our creative innovation in the composition process

MyRun: balancing design for reflection, recounting and openness in a museum-based participatory platform

Cultural organisations are increasingly looking towards using digital technologies to supplement, augment and extend visitors' experiences of exhibits and museums. In this paper, we describe the design and evaluation of MyRun, a 'participatory platform' for a museum. Our goal with MyRun was to use experience-centered design principles of reflecting, recounting and openness as a basis for engaging visitors in sharing stories about experiences related to a nationally significant cultural event. We undertook a qualitative evaluation of the system based upon observations of its use, the contributions visitors made to the platform, and interviews with 10 visitors. We discuss how visitors approached MyRun, contributed and browsed stories, and the challenges associated with the expectations visitors and curators placed on cultural exhibits. We close by identifying a series of design opportunities for future participatory platforms in museum settings

X-HALE: A Very Flexible UAV for Nonlinear Aeroelastic Tests

Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/83578/1/AIAA-2010-2715-581.pd