Search

This essay intends to take stock of the performance of the presidential elections polls of 2018. In a first section, the relevant sources of information that account for the phenomenon are defined. In a second section the theoretical concepts are reviewed on how the accuracy of the electoral surveys should be measured. In a third section the defects of measurements that do not conform to the orthodox procedures of the field are discovered, with a view to deepen, in the following point, in the performance obtained by the polls on the occasion of the presidential elections of 2018, although leaving in a latter section some aspects that revealed still problematic aspects to explain. Finally, the performance achieved in this year is evaluated in comparison with that observed in other occasions., En este ensayo se pretende hacer un balance del rendimiento de las encuestas en ocasión de la elección presidencial de 2018. Para ello, en un primer apartado, se definen las fuentes de información pertinentes que dan cuenta del fenómeno. En un segundo apartado se repasan los conceptos teóricos sobre cómo debe medirse la exactitud de las encuestas electorales. En el tercero, se descubren los defectos de mediciones que no se apegan a los procedimientos ortodoxos del campo, con miras a profundizar, en el apartado siguiente, en el rendimiento logrado por las encuestas en ocasión de los comicios presidenciales de 2018. En un apartado posterior, se analizan algunas cuestiones que revelaron aspectos todavía problemáticos de explicar. Finalmente, se evalúa el rendimiento logrado este año en comparación con el que se observó en otras ocasiones.

The objective of this essay is to analyze the polls conducted before the twenty four elections for local executives (Governors or Government's Head) in Mexico in the period of 2016-2018, by comparing their estimates against the results, using tools of political, statistical and demoscopic analysis. This exercise of joint evaluation of polls, never before done, provides many surprises that make it necessary to question old assumptions and risk new explanatory hypotheses about the reasons that favor accuracy in measurements; provisional hypotheses that must be compared with the data that bring new electoral events. In a central way, the results force to assume that the competition format in each election is the determining factor in the accuracy observed by the polls., El objetivo de este ensayo es analizar las encuestas previas a las veinticuatro elecciones para Ejecutivos locales (Gobernador y Jefe de Gobierno) en México en el período 2016-2018 mediante el cotejo de sus estimaciones contra los resultados, haciendo uso de herramientas propias del análisis político, estadístico y demoscópico. Este ejercicio de evaluación conjunta de las encuestas, nunca antes realizado, depara múltiples sorpresas que obligan a cuestionar viejos supuestos y arriesgar nuevas hipótesis explicativas sobre las razones que propician la exactitud en las mediciones, hipótesis necesariamente provisionales que deberán confrontarse con los datos que aporten nuevos eventos electorales. De manera central, los resultados obligan a asumir que el formato de la competencia en cada elección es el factor determinante en la exactitud observada por las encuestas.

This essay reviews the main sources of public access information on the development of the COVID-19 pandemic in Mexico; what have been the concepts they have handled and their operational definition; what its characteristics, scope and limitations; what data has been provided in each source; how a certain data source is linked with others and how this makes it possible, within accuracy margins that leave space for speculation, the construction of a statistical model that enables a comprehensive and coherent estimation of the incidents of cases and deaths caused by the SARS-CoV-2 virus and the consequences caused in the health of the population of Mexico by this pandemic. Although with the data directly provided in a database by the health authorities of the country it is possible to know the volume of cases confirmed as positive for SARS-CoV-2 through various methods, this information only accounts for part of the phenomenon and leaves hides the real magnitude of the pandemic Therefore, the expansion of cases from alternative sources is necessary, as at the time was the results of the sentinel model and now the data from the National Survey of Health and Nutrition COVID-19 and the count of excess mortality according to the registration of death certificates carried out by various public institutions in a coordinated manner. These sources allow corroborating that at the close of the first year of the pandemic, just under half of the country's population, 60 million people, had been infected with the virus that causes COVID-19 and the volume of deaths added to normal reached almost 300 thousand people.

Background: Understanding how people react to the COVID-19 crisis, and what the consequences are of the COVID-19 pandemic is key to enable public health and other agencies to develop optimal intervention strategies. Objective: Because the timely identification of new cases of infection has proven to be the key to timely respond to the spread of infection within a particular region, we have developed a method that can detect and predict the emergence of new cases of COVID-19 at an early stage. Further, this method can give useful insights into a family’s life during the pandemic and give the prediction of birth rates. Methods: The basic methodological concept of our approach is to monitor the digital trace of language searches with the Google Trends analytical tool (GT). We divided the keyword frequency for selected words giving us a search frequency index and then compared searches with official statistics to prove the significations of results. Results: 1.) Google Trends tools are suitable for predicting the emergence of new COVID-19 cases in Croatia. The data collected by this method correlate with official data. In Croatia search activities using GT for terms such as "PCR +COVID", and symptoms "cough + corona", "pneumonia + corona"; "muscle pain + corona" correlate strongly with officially reported cases of the disease. 2.) The method also shows effects on family life, increase in stress, and domestic violence. 3.) Birth rate in 2021 will be just 87% of what it would be "a normal year“ in Croatia. 4.) This tool can give useful insights into domestic violence. Limitations: Unquestionably, there are still significant open methodological issues and the questionable integrity of the data obtained using this source. The fact is also a problem that GT does not provide data on which population was sampled or how it was structured. Conclusion: Although these open-ended issues pose serious challenges for making clear estimates, statistics offer a range of tools available

Sound questionnaire translation is crucial for collecting equivalent data in cross-national surveys. The topic is widely discussed in fields in which translated questionnaires are used, such as in the social sciences or in cross-cultural psychology, but hardly in translation studies. This article aims at bridging this gap by bringing the genre of questionnaires closer to translation scholars and practitioners. To begin with, we will provide a sketch of key characteristics of cross-national survey methodology, with a special focus on questionnaire translation. Next, the multi-dimensional concept of translation competence will be introduced. Along the ISO 17100 competence model then, we will list requirements, challenges, and resources for questionnaire translation and illustrate those with examples. The concluding paragraph will highlight areas for interdisciplinary research involving both translation studies and cross-national survey methodology.

Research comparing heterosexuals with bisexuals and homosexuals in economics and the social sciences typically relies on two strategies to identify sexual orientation in existing survey data of general populations. Probing respondents to self-report their sexual orientation is generally considered the preferred option. Since self-reports are unavailable in most large multidisciplinary surveys, often researchers infer sexual orientation from the gender-constellation of a respondent’s partnership instead. Based on German Socio-Economic Panel (SOEP) data, this article reviews both strategies empirically in the context of a household panel survey. The analysis shows that self-reported and partnership-inferred sexual orientation are not mutual substitutes, instead leading to substantively different conclusions about differences between heterosexuals and LGBs (Lesbian, Gays, and Bisexuals). The article discusses problems of non-coverage in partnership-inferred sexual orientation and also investigates measurement error in self-reported sexual orientation, finding notable mode and interviewer effects.

Timely and accurate demographic data, resulting from robust Civil Registration and Vital Statistics [CRVS] systems play critical roles in facilitating the realisation of key developmental goals in most countries. A well-functioning CRVS system can afford Nigeria the ambit to gather timely data for evidence-based policy-making. However, just as in many other developing countries, Nigeria’s CRVS framework is plagued by weak institutional linkages resulting to poor quality sociodemographic data. Therefore, this paper focused on the importance of a robust CRVS system as source of quality sociodemographic data in Nigeria, with the objective of situating it within the broader context of good governance. The paper is primarily theoretical and employed the activity theory to examine access to and use of population-based data from the CRVS system for good governance. This paper concludes that the inability to generate actionable and quality population-based data due to Nigeria’s weak CRVS system, as well as non-data driven socioeconomic policies hinders good governance. Therefore, more investments are needed to scale-up Nigeria’s CRVS system and the resulting sociodemographic data should be a priority in driving national policy-making for good governance.

In this modern era, the situational crime prevention is one of the most emphasised and key concern of whole world. Devil exists almost everywhere in a society, to do wrongs or committing crimes. Therefore, a society must have some strict policies and techniques to contain these evils. The current research highlights societal perception regarding situational crime prevention. The main objectives of the study was to find out the effects of two most commonly used tools (i.e. CCTV and Street lights) on the situational crime prevention. To cater these objectives, quantitative research was conducted through survey questionnaire from Faculty of Social Sciences, Crime reporter and Criminal lawyers. In current research, data was collected form 134 respondents from participants of these three different backgrounds. On the basis of collected data, the study finds that both tools i.e. CCTV and Street lights play a key role in situational crime prevention. The study concluded that government organizations should install the CCTVs and Street lights in order to prevent the situational crime rate.

Longitudinal social surveys are widely used to understand which factors enable or constrain access to higher education. One such data resource is the Next Steps survey comprising an initial sample of 16,122 pupils aged 13-14 attending English state and private schools in 2004, with follow up annually to age 19-20 and a further survey at age 25. The Next Steps data is a potentially rich resource for studying inequalities of access to higher education. It contains a wealth of information about pupils' social background characteristics - including household income, parental education, parental social class, housing tenure and family composition - as well as longitudinal data on aspirations, choices and outcomes in relation to education. However, as with many longitudinal social surveys, Next Steps suffers from a substantial amount of missing data due to item non-response and sample attrition which may seriously compromise the reliability of research findings. Helpfully, Next Steps data has been linked with more robust administrative data from the National Pupil Database (NPD), which contains a more limited range of social background variables, but has comparatively little in the way of missing data due to item non-response or attrition. We analyse these linked datasets to assess the implications of missing data for the reliability of Next Steps. We show that item non-response in Next Steps biases the apparent socioeconomic composition of the Next Steps sample upwards, and that this bias is exacerbated by sample attrition since Next Steps participants from less advantaged social backgrounds are more likely to drop out of the study. Moreover, by the time it is possible to measure access to higher education, the socioeconomic background variables in Next Steps are shown to have very little explanatory power after controlling for the social background and educational attainment variables contained in the NPD. Given these findings, we argue that longitudinal social surveys

Research in Social Science is usually based on survey data where individual research questions relate to observable concepts (variables). However, due to a lack of standards for data citations a reliable identification of the variables used is often difficult. In this paper, we present a work-in-progress study that seeks to provide a solution to the variable detection task based on supervised machine learning algorithms, using a linguistic analysis pipeline to extract a rich feature set, including terminological concepts and similarity metric scores. Further, we present preliminary results on a small dataset that has been specifically designed for this task, yielding modest improvements over the baseline.

Left-right self-placement on a unidimensional scale is a standard question in many social and political surveys to measure respondents' ideological orientation in a minimalist way.Although the left-right scale is a standard question, the scale design is not standardized across surveys. One aspect of scale design is the offer of a midpoint. This paper is about design effects on central left-right scale placement in a cross-national context. How do respondents answer if there is no true midpoint: Do respondents who want to express a middle position, in the case of a 10-point scale, use scale middle categories as a substitute for a true midpoint? Are findings consistent across countries? Offering a midpoint is much debated among researchers and quite often, a midpoint might serve as a hidden "don't know" or a missing attitude. Does nonresponse increase when non-attitudes cannot be expressed by choosing the neutral midpoint to hide nonresponse? If middle categories in the 10-point scale work as substitute for a true midpoint in the 11-point scale, nonresponse will not differ. We tested these questions in a split-half experiment where either a 10-point or an 11-point scale was asked in an experimental web survey fielded in six countries. Our results seem to confirm the idea that respondents who favor choosing a scale middle find a virtual center in the 10-point scale. However, results are inconsistent in cross-national perspective.

In this paper we outline the methodological development of current research into urban community formations based on combinations of qualitative (volunteered) and quantitative (spatial analytical and geo-statistical) data. We outline a research design that addresses problems of data quality relating to credibility in volunteered geographic information (VGI) intended for Web-enabled participatory planning. Here we have drawn on a dual notion of credibility in VGI data, and propose a methodological workflow to address its criteria. We propose a ‘super-positional’ model of urban community formations, and report on the combination of quantitative and participatory methods employed to underpin its integration. The objective of this methodological phase of study is to enhance confidence in the quality of data for Web-enabled participatory planning. Our participatory method has been supported by rigorous quantification of area characteristics, including participant communities’ demographic and socio-economic contexts. This participatory method provided participants with a ready and accessible format for observing and mark-making, which allowed the investigators to iterate rapidly a system design based on participants’ responses to the workshop tasks. Participatory workshops have involved secondary school-age children in socio-economically contrasting areas of Liverpool (Merseyside, UK), which offers a test-bed for comparing communities’ formations in comparative contexts, while bringing an under-represented section of the population into a planning domain, whose experience may stem from public and non-motorised transport modalities. Data has been gathered through one-day participatory workshops, featuring questionnaire surveys, local site analysis, perception mapping and brief, textual descriptions. This innovative approach will support Web-based participation among stakeholding planners, who may benefit from well-structured, community-volunteered, geo-located definitions

The diverse forms of participation in social media raise many methodological and ethical issues that should be acknowledged in research. In this paper, participation in social media is studied by utilising the framework of explicit and implicit participation. The focus is on the communicative and communal aspects of social media. The aim of the paper is to promote the reconsideration of what constitutes participation when online users create connections rather than content. The underlying argument is that research on social media and the development of methods should concentrate more on implicit forms of participation.

Drawing on John Agnew’s (1987) theoretical framework for the analysis of place (location, locale and sense of place) and on Doreen Massey’s (1991) interpretation of Kilburn High Road (London), the contribution develops an analysis of the notion of place in the case study of Kilburn High Road by comparing the semantics emerging from Doreen Massey’s interpretation of Kilburn High Road in the late Nineties with those from a selection of noisy and unstructured volunteered geographic information collected from Flickr photos and Tweets harvested in 2014–2015. The comparison shows how sense of place is dynamic and changing over time and explores Kilburn High Road through the categories of location, locale and sense of place derived from the qualitative analysis of VGI content and annotations. The contribution shows how VGI can contribute to discovering the unique relationship between people and place which takes the form given by Doreen Massey to Kilburn High Road and then moves on to the many forms given by people experiencing Kilburn High Road through a photo, a Tweet or a simple narrative. Finally, the paper suggests that the analysis of VGI content can contribute to detect the relevant features of street life, from infrastructure to citizens’ perceptions, which should be taken into account for a more human-centered approach in planning or service management.

Recently, Adams and Tiesdell (2010), Tewdwr-Jones (2012) and Batty (2013) have outlined the importance of information and intelligence in relation to the mediation and management of land, property and urban consumers in the future city. Traditionally, the challenge for urban planners was the generation of meaningful and timely information. Today, the urban planners’ challenge is no longer the timely generation of urban data, rather, it is in relation to how so much information can be exploited and integrated successfully into contemporary spatial planning and governance. The paper investigates this challenge through a commentary on two City Information Modelling (CIM) case studies at Northumbria University, UK. This commentary is grouped around four key themes, Accessibility and availability of data, accuracy and consistency of data, manageability of data and integration of data. It is also designed to provoke discussion in relation to the exploitation and improvement of data modelling and visualisation in the urban planning discipline and to contribute to the literature in related fields. The paper concludes that the production of information, its use and modelling, can empower urban planners as they mediate and contest state-market relations in the city. However, its use should be circumspect as data alone does not guarantee delivery of a sustainable urban future, rather, emphasis and future research should be placed upon interpretation and use of data.

This article suggests a new methodological model for the study of hybrid media events with global appeal. This model, developed in the project on the 2015 Charlie Hebdo attacks in Paris, was created specifically for researching digital media - and in particular, Twitter. The article is structured as follows. Firstly, the methodological scope is discussed against the theoretical context, e.g. the theory of media events. In the theoretical discussion, special emphasis is given to i) disruptive, upsetting, or disintegrative media events and hybrid media events and ii) the conditions of today's heterogeneous and globalised media communication landscape. Secondly, the article introduces a multi-method approach developed for the analysis of hybrid media events. In this model, computational social science - namely, automated content analysis (ACA) and social network analytics (SNA) - are combined with a qualitative approach - specifically, digital ethnography. The article outlines three key phases for research in which the interplay between quantitative and qualitative approaches is played out. In the first phase, preliminary digital ethnography is applied to provide the outline of the event. In the second phase, quantitative social network analytics are applied to construct the digital field for research. In this phase, it is necessary to map a) what is circulating on the websites and b) where this circulation takes place. The third and final phase applies a qualitative approach and digital ethnography to provide a more nuanced, in-depth interpretation of what (substance/content) is circulating and how this material connects with the ‘where’ in the digital landscape, hence constituting links and connections in the hybrid media landscape. In conclusion, the article reflects on how this multi-method approach contributes to understanding the workings of today's hybrid media events: how they create and maintain symbolic battles over certain imagined constructs of social imagi

With the prevalence of smartphones, new ways of engaging citizens and stakeholders in urban planning and governance are emerging. The technologies in smartphones allow citizens to act as sensors of their environment, producing and sharing rich spatial data useful for new types of collaborative governance set-ups. Data derived from Volunteered Geographic Information (VGI) can support accessible, transparent, democratic, inclusive, and locally-based governance situations of interest to planners, citizens, politicians, and scientists. However, there are still uncertainties about how to actually conduct this in practice. This study explores how social media VGI can be used to document spatial tendencies regarding citizens’ uses and perceptions of urban nature with relevance for urban green space governance. Via the hashtag #sharingcph, created by the City of Copenhagen in 2014, VGI data consisting of geo-referenced images were collected from Instagram, categorised according to their content and analysed according to their spatial distribution patterns. The results show specific spatial distributions of the images and main hotspots. Many possibilities and much potential of using VGI for generating, sharing, visualising and communicating knowledge about citizens’ spatial uses and preferences exist, but as a tool to support scientific and democratic interaction, VGI data is challenged by practical, technical and ethical concerns. More research is needed in order to better understand the usefulness and application of this rich data source to governance.

This article analyzes the ethical discussion focusing on the Facebook emotional contagion experiment published by the 'Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences' in 2014. The massive-scale experiment manipulated the News Feeds of a large amount of Facebook users and was successful in proving that emotional contagion happens also in online environments. However, the experiment caused ethical concerns within and outside academia mainly for two intertwined reasons, the first revolving around the idea of research as manipulation, and the second focusing on the problematic definition of informed consent. The article concurs with recent research that the era of social media and big data research are posing a significant challenge to research ethics, the practice and views of which are grounded in the pre social media era, and reflect the classical ethical stances of utilitarianism and deontology.

Volunteered geographic information (VGI), delivered via mobile and web apps, offers new potentials for civic engagement. If framed in the context of open, transparent and accountable governance then presumably VGI should advance dialogue and consultation between citizen and government. If governments perceive citizens as consumers of services then arguably such democratic intent elide when municipalities use VGI. Our empirical research shows how assumptions embedded in VGI drive the interaction between citizens and government. We created a typology that operationalises VGI as a potential act of citizenship and an instance of consumption. We then selected civic apps from Canadian cities that appeared to invoke these VGI types. We conducted interviews with developers of the apps; they were from government, private sector, and civil society. Results from qualitative semi-structured interviews indicate a blurring of consumer and citizen-centric orientations among respondents, which depended on motivations for data use, engagement and communication objectives, and sector of the respondent. Citizen engagement, an analogue for citizenship, was interpreted multiple ways. Overall, we found that government and developers may increase choice by creating consumer-friendly apps but this does not ensure VGI offers an act of civic participation. The burden is placed on the contributor to make it so. Apps and VGI could potentially further a data-driven and neoliberal government. Planners should be mindful of the dominance of a consumer-centric view even as they assume VGI invariably improves democratic participation.

Governing Surveillance Infrastructure is a study that discusses how governance and surveillance are performed in the Snowden documents. This thesis is performed in the intersection between ‘Surveillance Studies’ and ‘Science and Technology Studies’ (STS), with the aim to contribute to the discussions within the field of ‘Surveillance Studies’. In an ongoing debate about how surveillance affects security and our privacy this thesis takes a step away from this dominating narrative and discusses the governing mechanisms of this surveillance infrastructure as performed in the Snowden documents. Avoiding the use of the traditional metaphors used to study surveillance this study is proposing that understanding governance mechanisms enable us to broaden how surveillance can be understood and studied. By identifying and discussing the governance mechanisms as performed in the Snowden documents, I will not only be able to understand how they function in this particular setting. It will also enable me to introduce a way to study surveillance through governance that contributes to a more nuanced way of understanding how surveillance is performed today.

Objective: To investigate issues addressed in the scientific productions available in online journals about HIV/Aids and of social representations during the 2004 to 2014 timeframe. Method: It is an integrative literature review. The data collection occurred in October 2014, based on searches in LILACS, BDENF, SCIELO and Index Psi technical and scientific Journals databases. Results: The sample consisted of 26 publications whose approach raised three categories: social representations of the HIV/Aids phenomenon; social representations about people living with HIV/Aids; social representations about health care to HIV-positive people. Conclusion: The analyzed articles express the importance of social representations in creation processes and changes related to the disease, both for the patients, as well as for professionals and caregivers, who can present different behaviors upon health practices.

Conference Proceedings of the first Interdisciplinary Forum "How to research Corruption?", Amsterdam (Netherlands), 2016. The publication includes nine sections on different methods used in corruption research, reflecting the program of the conference.

Educational sector is significant in any society as it plays a crucial role for developing the nation. Educational evaluation determines the effectiveness of the learning process and it interests all educational stakeholders. Currently, one of the challenges that the Ministry of Education in Oman is facing is to evaluate the performance of the school; this problem can be addressed through the use of modern technologies, such as the use of data mining. This study proposes to employee data mining to link between the different performance indicators with a goal of getting complete and effective evaluation for any school. Several classification techniques were exploited to analyze school performance. The results demonstrate a high accuracy level.

For the last few decades, the Internet continually has changed scholarly workflows across disciplines. It has affected how scholars search for publications, retrieve information and communicate and distribute their own research findings. Online communication and collaboration influences academic institutions as well as academic publishers, science journalists and students. Within this special issue, we focus on social media and its influence on academic practice. (auhtor's abstract)

In the last decade advances of computer technologies have lead towards a technological reality where the line between information consumers and information producers is blurred. This technological omnipresence allows for unprecedented data creation capabilities. Based on various data sources, it seems humans have fully embraced data-generating activities. One such activity is using online social network applications, like Facebook or Twitter in almost all aspects of their lives. One of the main features of online social network applications is perceived freedom of speech, individuality and privacy, even though every application has some special features. Therefore, content generated using these services presents the public with interesting insights in private life of people and their attitudes towards public affairs. Social network applications are active the most during specific public events aimed at the massive public. Due to its brevity, ease of use and frequency, Twitter is an interesting social network application for research and analysis. Other than allowing almost exclusively short messages (up to 140 characters), a tweet (a Twitter post) can contain location of the message sender as well as a graphic to accompany the textual message. The textual part of the message may contain so called hashtags – keywords used for indexing and easy identification of a subject the message is related to. These hashtags allow us to group messages related to a specific event. Recent governmental elections held in Croatia were very popular amongst the Croatian Twitter community. Usage of hashtags allowed us to identify the right messages and thus most-used words to describe this event and potentially identify how people felt when talking, i.e. writing, about politics and the held elections. Furthermore, geolocation information, optionally embedded in a tweet, makes it possible to analyze which keywords were used in which parts of Croatia, all pertaining to the held governmenta

Qualitative research on the disability cultures and environments that support or perform lifelong education of adults with disabilities in Poland are carried out intensively since the late 90s of the twentieth century. This paper clarifies the dilemmas and delicate issues while the rapport process of qualitative research and associated with collection of the data on socially vulnerable groups, disability cultures and adults with intellectual mental, physical disabilities or psychiatric disorders. The concepts were generated on the basis of secondary analysis of the qualitative research projects led by18 beginner researchers, students of the undergraduate or graduate studies in Education or Special Education at Nicolaus Copernicus University in Poland.

The social web or web 2.0 has become the biggest and most accessible repository of data about human (social) behavior in history. Due to a knowledge gap between big data analytics and established social science methodology, this enormous source of information, has yet to be exploited for new and interesting studies in various social and humanities related fields. To make one step towards closing this gap, we provide a detailed step-by-step tutorial on some of the most important web mining and analytics methods on a real-world study of Croatia’s biggest political blogging site. The tutorial covers methods for data retrieval, data conversion, cleansing and organization, data analysis (natural language processing, social and conceptual network analysis) as well as data visualization and interpretation. All tools that have been implemented for the sake of this study, data sets through the various steps as well as resulting visualizations have been published on-line and are free to use. The tutorial is not meant to be a comprehensive overview and detailed description of all possible ways of analyzing data from the social web, but using the steps outlined herein one can certainly reproduce the results of the study or use the same or similar methodology for other datasets. Results of the study show that a special kind of conceptual network generated by natural language processing of articles on the blogging site, namely a conceptual network constructed by the rule that two concepts (keywords) are connected if they were extracted from the same article, seem to be the best predictor of the current political discourse in Croatia when compared to the other constructed conceptual networks. These results indicate that a comprehensive study has to be made to investigate this conceptual structure further with an accent on the dynamic processes that have led to the construction of the network.

"Big Data is the oil of the new economy" is the most famous citation during the three last years. It has even been adopted by the World Economic Forum in 2011. In fact, Big Data is like crude! It's valuable, but if unrefined it cannot be used. It must be broken down, analyzed for it to have value. But what about Big Data generated by the Petroleum Industry and particularly its upstream segment? Upstream is no stranger to Big Data. Understanding and leveraging data in the upstream segment enables firms to remain competitive throughout planning, exploration, delineation, and field development. Oil & Gas Companies conduct advanced geophysics modeling and simulation to support operations where 2D, 3D & 4D Seismic generate significant data during exploration phases. They closely monitor the performance of their operational assets. To do this, they use tens of thousands of data-collecting sensors in subsurface wells and surface facilities to provide continuous and real-time monitoring of assets and environmental conditions. Unfortunately, this information comes in various and increasingly complex forms, making it a challenge to collect, interpret, and leverage the disparate data. As an example, Chevron's internal IT traffic alone exceeds 1.5 terabytes a day. Big Data technologies integrate common and disparate data sets to deliver the right information at the appropriate time to the correct decision-maker. These capabilities help firms act on large volumes of data, transforming decision-making from reactive to proactive and optimizing all phases of exploration, development and production. Furthermore, Big Data offers multiple opportunities to ensure safer, more responsible operations. Another invaluable effect of that would be shared learning. The aim of this paper is to explain how to use Big Data technologies to optimize operations. How can Big Data help experts to decision-making leading the desired outcomes?

This article explores some of the key current research and statistical evidence available on the global scale of trafficking in human beings, and considers the assumption that the occurrence of trafficking is increasing. The value and limitations of this statistical data is identified, as is the relationship between the research base and the resulting legal and policy responses. This allows an assessment of whether there is a connection between the perceived problem and the responses to trafficking victims' circumstances. It questions whether assumptions, generalisations and policies can be based around the available data and the responsibilities of individual countries, including the UK and the wider international community, in relation to the improvement of data collection. The article also considers signs of progress in terms of data collection and suggests further future improvements that need to be made to the approach taken.

Many approaches to work-related stress risk assessement suggest the integration between a phase where objective data are collected and analysed, and a phase where results of data collection and analysis are discussed and compared with information coming from the workers. On the other side, the use of self-report job stress measures has been criticized, due to their potential distortions, and stress researchers have repeatedly called for an approach based on the use of objective measures. The Italian law for work-related stress risk assessment, closer to the latter approach, prescribes a two-stage procedure: first a set of objective measures and then, conditionally to the outcome of the first stage, a set of subjective measures. We therefore describe and critically review, on the basis of psychometric principles, the tool used for the objective stage in the most adopted method in Italy. Such a tool is a checklist for which we discuss a number of issues suggesting it is not methodologically well founded. We conclude these weaknesses affect the practice of work-related stress risk assessment.