Search

While people's social backgrounds clearly shape their adoption of digital technology and the Internet, their urban lifestyles and place of residence better explain their digital activities when they are online, and how they use technology. Most studies investigating individuals' use of digitization have neglected the effects of the physical built environment and the daily life of the community. Addressing this gap, this paper places digital practices in the socio-spatial world, and conceptualizes the term "urban digital lifestyle," which refers to the dynamic relationships among three dimensions: (1) the user's socioeconomic status, (2) the user's residency, with a focus on the locale's socio-spatial characteristics, and (3) the user's digital practices. Empirically, this paper uses a mixture of methods to analyze the digital usage of residents in four neighborhoods in Tel Aviv. The methods used are neighborhood prototype analysis, digital practices survey (n = 490), and spatial and GIS analyses. Although the results may at first glance support the argument that education and socioeconomic status have significant influence on digital practices, these practices also reflect many other factors associated with the urban lifestyle. Thus, locales, places and neighborhoods remain crucial socio-spatial categories that have a major influence on daily life in the digital age. • Conceptualization of Urban Digital Lifestyle (UDL) offers a new temporal reading of digital differences in a city. • UDL is a helpful category for juxtaposing user's socioeconomic status, user's digital practices, and locale's sociospatial characteristics. • UDL is a helpful tool to identify (1) types of digital lifestyles, and (2) clustering of these digital lifestyles in geographical context. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• 193 full-scale tests of tracked vehicles in a progressive slip condition reported. • Parabolic trends were found between DBP versus slip and torque versus slip. • Trends between STMN versus DBP, traction, and torque were influenced by slip. • A modest parabolic trend between sinkage and CP/CI ratio was discovered. In 2013, an extensive effort began to create a consolidated off-road vehicle mobility database named DROVE (Database Records for Off-road Vehicle Environments). DROVE consists of over 8,500 experimental test records measured over several decades for wheeled and tracked vehicles over various terrains. This paper introduces the third release of DROVE, which adds results from 193 tests primarily consisting of data for tracked vehicles on fine-grained soils in a progressive slip condition. Performance parameters considered in DROVE 3.0 include drawbar pull, torque, sinkage, and traction. These parameters were compared to mobility numerics, such as soil-track mobility number, contact pressure to cone index ratio, and mean maximum pressure. These parameters were used to develop mobility trends in this paper. DROVE is intended to be a resource for the mobility community applicable to many situations, including evaluating and advancing numerical simulations, improving closed-form algorithms, and understanding vehicular trends that can be used for development or purchase specifications. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

OBJECTIVE: Pediatric health systems are increasingly screening caregivers for unmet social needs. However, it remains unclear how best to connect families with unmet needs to available and appropriate community resources. We aimed to explore caregivers' perceived barriers to and facilitators of community resource connection. METHODS: We conducted semistructured interviews with caregivers of pediatric patients admitted to one inpatient unit of an academic quaternary care children's hospital. All caregivers who screened positive for one or more unmet social needs on a tablet-based screener were invited to participate in an interview. Interviews were recorded, transcribed, and coded by 2 independent coders using content analysis, resolving discrepancies by consensus. Interviews continued until thematic saturation was achieved. RESULTS: We interviewed 28 of 31 eligible caregivers. Four primary themes emerged. First, caregivers of children with complex chronic conditions felt that competing priorities related to their children's medical care often made it more challenging to establish connection with resources. Second, caregivers cited burdensome application and enrollment processes as a barrier to resource connection. Third, caregivers expressed a preference for geographically tailored, web-based resources, rather than paper resources. Last, caregivers expressed a desire for ongoing longitudinal support in establishing and maintaining connections with community resources after their child's hospital discharge. CONCLUSION: Pediatric caregivers with unmet social needs reported competing priorities and burdensome application processes as barriers to resource connection. Electronic resources can help caregivers identify locally available services, but longitudinal supports may also be needed to ensure caregivers can establish and maintain linkages with these services. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As the basic unit of social governance grid in China, urban community plays an active and important role in the promotion of comprehensive ability of social governance in China while the intelligent management of human resources within community management organizations and the effective integration of external human resources plays a decisive role in improving the overall level of social governance. This paper analyzes the three problems of human resource management in urban community under conditions of normalized epidemic prevention and control, such as unreasonable personnel allocation, large internal consumption of human resources, less strength of personnel reserve, weak integration ability, imperfect supervision mechanism and insufficient human resource incentive mechanism. It is concluded that only by adhering to the thinking of intelligent guidance, technology empowerment and information platform, can the community effectively promote the modernization of social governance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Extreme heat events are the deadliest weather-related event in the United States. Cities throughout the United States have worked to develop heat adaptation strategies to limit the impact of extreme heat on vulnerable populations. However, the COVID-19 pandemic presented unprecedented challenges to local governments. This paper provides a preliminary review of strategies and interventions used to manage compound COVID-19-extreme heat events in the 25 most populous cities of the United States. Heat adaptation strategies employed prior to the COVID-19 pandemic were not adequate to meet during the co-occurring compound hazard of COVID-19-EHE. Long-term climate-adaptation strategies will require leveraging physical, financial, and community resources across multiple city departments to meet the needs of compound hazards, such as COVID-19 and extreme heat. • Cities faced compound crises of COVID-19 and extreme heat in 2020. • 2020 heat response plans analyzed for 25 largest US cities. • Public health and financial limitations significantly reduced cooling access. • Record breaking temperatures left many vulnerable to heat illness and death. • Adaptation and mitigation strategies are needed to manage compound heat events. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Decentralizing forest control to community-based groups is a widely promoted form of governance around the world. Community Resource Management Areas (CREMAs) in Ghana, a form of forest decentralization, is a relatively recent government strategy to reduce forest loss, promote restoration, and improve local control and participation in resource management. This paper examines the powers devolved to CREMAs in Ghana, using a political ecology lens. Using a variety of qualitative research methods, the paper found that CREMAs receive limited powers from the State and these powers mainly restrict local access to resources, an action the State has often failed at. The results also suggest that CREMAs impose responsibility on local people without accompanying resources and often at the expense of security and safety of local volunteer enforcers. The findings also highlight the lack of coherence between forest decentralization and exiting political decentralization processes; the incoherence between the different institutional regulations for CREMAs; and tensions between new and traditional forms of local resource governance. The study suggests that critical approaches to evaluating the performance of decentralized regimes could be a useful approach to understanding the drivers of vulnerability among local resource users, dependents, and their institutions. • Community Resource Management Areas (CREMAs) burden local people with forest protection with little reward. • Absence of resource transfer from the state and local forest control set CREMAs up for potential collapse. • CREMAs highlight the incoherencies in political and forest decentralization, and traditional resource management systems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the past century, the increasing scale of daily life has weakened and changed the ways residents feel attached to their village. A general and all-encompassing village attachment has evolved into less involving, more selective and partial forms of attachment. Concerns have been raised as to whether these changing forms affect volunteering in village life. In this paper we distinguish between general and selective forms of attachment to the village – social, cultural and environmental attachment – and explore their effects on local volunteering. In line with the theory of 's/elective belonging', we hypothesise that a general attachment to the village predicts high levels of volunteering in village life, whereas selective forms of attachment only predict volunteering in activities related to the specific form of attachment. Based on survey data on over 5000 rural residents, the results show that general attachment only predicts volunteering to a limited extent and that social attachment does so best. Thus, a loosening general attachment to the village may not weaken community activity as is often feared. Instead, it is social attachment that motivates and facilitates volunteering, including among in-migrants. Efforts to strengthen local communities should therefore focus on enhancing social relations between villagers. • A strong general attachment to the village does not necessarily translate into active volunteering. • Selective forms of attachment to the village are found to be salient predictors of volunteering in village life. • A transition from general to selective forms of attachment will not jeopardize the existence of active village communities. • Efforts to strengthen local communities should focus on enhancing social relations between villagers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents the results of a survey regarding customer satisfaction as well as other aspects relating to the frequency and motivations of citizens going to a separate collection centre (SCC) for recyclables in a Southern Italian town. The study was carried out in 2015 to verify whether there were significant changes in the behaviours and opinions of the SCC’s users, who had been interviewed in 2013, in the light of the change of the local administration. The majority of the respondents (60.4%) coupled going to the SCC with other tasks, with 58.6% of them going to a supermarket. Therefore, future SCCs should localized near shopping centres (it would be preferable to have small and numerous SCCs). Chi-square and Fisher's exact tests showed how SCC’s users of the town under study behaved as a community. The percentage of respondents that declared to ‘agree’ or ‘strongly agree’ with the idea that only putrescibles and residue could be collected at their home, with all the other materials being collected at the SCC, increased from 56.6%, in 2013, up to 59.0%, in 2015. The percentage of respondents that declared going to the SCC due to environmental motivations was unanimous. Moreover, the saving of money for the community became the second preferred option, with a significant improvement (from 65.6%, in 2013, up to 93.2%, in 2015). Therefore, the community’s interests over the individual’s were privileged. The SCC’s users confirmed their attention to environmental issues even though the local administration changed. It is probable that this could be the result of maintaining high standard of service as well as a good job in terms of communication, continuous involvment of citizens and the adoption of good environmental practices. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Community-based natural resource management (CBNRM) has the potential to conserve resources while simultaneously empowering traditionally marginalized communities. Because classical equation-based modeling methods fail to capture the complexity of CBNRM, Agent-Based Modeling (ABM) has emerged as a useful method for modeling these systems. In this paper, we begin with a careful evaluation and sensitivity analysis of an existing ABM of community forest management that incorporates cheating and enforcement which we call the Cheating and Enforcement model. Our results reveal several emergent behaviors of the model that are paradoxical or inconsistent with real-world expectations. We then introduce the Monitoring and Sanctioning model which makes several modifications to the cheating and enforcement mechanisms of the original ABM. Analyzing this new model, we see that it does not exhibit several of the more unusual behaviors of the original model and reveals surprising consistency with real-world CBNRM systems. Finally, we discuss some limitations of this new model and potential areas of further improvement. • Cheating and Enforcement (C&E) model removes cheaters from agent-based simulations. • Removing cheaters leads to paradoxical emergent behaviors. • Monitoring and Sanctioning model (M&S) uses graduated sanctions for enforcement. • M&S model exhibits emergent behaviors in line with existing literature. • Monitoring, sanctioning, and institutions all impact biomass in the M&S model. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

(i) A new defense resource allocation approach is proposed. (ii) The Self-Contained GN is applied to community partition. (iii) The covariance matrix of each community is established. (iv) The MVM is used to allocate the defense resource. A Self-Contained Girvan-Newman Algorithm and Mean Variance Model combined approach is proposed to allocate the defense resource in road dangerous goods transportation network. Firstly, the weighted physical network without direction and its weighted service network with direction are established. The Self-Contained Girvan-Newman Algorithm is applied to separate the whole weighted physical network into several communities. Next, based on the service network, the covariance matrix of each separated community is established, the Mean Variance Model is used to allocate the defense resource for each community, which focuses on selecting the option with the lowest probability of loss caused by the dangerous goods transportation accident/risk. The case study is conducted by using the road network and the dangerous goods transportation volume of Dalian, China as the background. When the whole network is separated into 6 communities, the defense resource capability in the whole network is the best. The Power Function Allocation Model (PFAM) is applied as the comparison approach, the overall rescue capability of the network is defined and applied to evaluate the defense resource allocation schemes. The results show that, the approach proposed in this paper has better effectiveness than PFAM, especially when the whole network is separated into 6 communities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]