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This study constructs Divisia monetary aggregates for the "Asian Tigers"—Hong Kong (1999–2024), South Korea (2009–2024), Singapore (1991–2021), and Taiwan (2005–2024)—and assesses whether Divisia monetary aggregates explain nominal GDP better than simple-sum money. Our findings demonstrate that Divisia indices respond more sensitively to economic shocks. For Hong Kong and Taiwan, narrow Divisia money provides the best explanations for fluctuations in nominal GDP. Our results suggest that Divisia monetary aggregates can be beneficial for monetary policy analysis in these territories and underscore the importance of further research into the empirical performance of Divisia monetary aggregates in macroeconomic prediction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Monte Carlo approximations for random linear elliptic PDE constrained optimization problems are studied. We use empirical process theory to obtain best possible mean convergence rates O (n - 1 2 ) for optimal values and solutions, and a central limit theorem for optimal values. The latter allows to determine asymptotically consistent confidence intervals by using resampling techniques. The theoretical results are illustrated with two sets of numerical experiments. The first demonstrates the theoretical convergence rates for optimal values and optimal solutions. This is complemented by a study illustrating the usage of subsampling bootstrap methods for estimating the confidence intervals. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Modern Educational Technology is the property of Editorial Board of Modern Educational Technology, Tsinghua University and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Muslim-minority countries have emerged among the largest exporters of halal products for the Muslim market and received significant numbers of inbound Muslim travellers. The global nature of the halal industry value chain calls for a thorough understanding about halal, particularly in the context of Muslim-minority countries. To gain this understanding, a systematic literature review was conducted to explore the themes of halal research in Muslim-minority countries. A total of 22 empirical research articles were analysed based on a review protocol adapted from ROSES. The articles were sourced from the Scopus and Web of Science, with Google Scholar as a supplementary database. The study generated five main themes that synthesise the scholarly knowledge about halal in the context of Muslim-minority countries at the consumer, organization, and institution levels of analysis. The findings illustrate the lack of understanding about halal among the industry players and consumers, as well as the lack of central governance and policymaking within the halal industry in Muslim-minority countries. Based on the findings, the study provides future direction for research and practice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The significance of life skills within educational settings has grown; however, there remains a gap regarding a comprehensive understanding of the overarching concept. This systematic scoping review addresses that need, with the aim to identify and map empirical research published between 2013 and 2023 focused on life skills in compulsory education (grade 1–10). In addition to mapping the studies according to their characteristics, how life skills are defined is also examined, with a specific focus on collectivistic and individualistic perspectives. Through a rigorous search process, 50 studies were identified. The studies are mainly concerned with evaluating the efficacy of life skills programs or interventions for adolescents. They define life skills by both the type of skill and what it achieves. Key trends include an emphasis on an individualistic understanding of the term, lacking collectivistic perspectives. The implications focus on life skills education connected to lifelong learning, Bildung, and holistic growth from a collectivistic perspective, suggesting that future research could include life skills education for younger children for more sustainable effects favorable for desired societal outcomes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We introduce a novel procedure to assess the goodness of fit in relational event models. Building on existing auxiliary variable approaches developed in network modelling, the procedure involves a comparison between statistics computed on observed relational event sequences and statistics calculated on event sequences simulated from the fitted model. We argue that the internal time structure of the relational mechanisms assumed to generate the observations under the model is an important aspect of the fit of a model to observed relational event sequences. We establish the empirical value of the proposed goodness of fit approach in an analysis of data that we collected on collaborative patient-referral relations among healthcare organizations. The illustrative case study that we develop reveals distinctive features of relational event models that have been ignored or overlooked in received empirical studies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A substitution of the traditional data sources allows National Statistical Institutes to collect large samples of product items with corresponding prices recorded over more frequent time periods. For some product categories, a frequent replacement of product items requires a dynamic approach to define a product sample that can be achieved by a monthly update of the sample. In a month-on-month comparison of price changes, bilateral indices must be chained that can lead to a chain drift bias. Multilateral methods are designed to reduce the chain drift, albeit not completely eliminate it. A disadvantage of multilateral methods is its ambiguous interpretability and a revision problem. The main objective of this paper is to show an implementation of multilateral methods for official price statistics in practice. The multilateral GEKS method is decomposed into elementary components that identifies the effect of successive price relatives used in its compilation. An importance of the decomposition is shown when interpreting the GEKS index in the context of official price statistics. We demonstrate that it can lead to an inaccurate public dissemination of the consumer price index. Moreover, we propose a new method for the splice extension that is required to avoid the revision of previously published indices. The method uses a Stein-type shrinkage estimator for the splice extension that is applied additively to the last published index. In the empirical study, we use web scraped data, which are obtained from the Slovak market, for comparison of bilateral and multilateral indices. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We present an empirical analysis of the relationship between trading permits, informal entrepreneurship and unemployment. We exploit a unique regulatory framework of the informal sector in South Africa to estimate the effects of trading permits in the informal sector using individual panel data. To provide a causal effect of these regulations, we apply a difference-in-difference strategy. Trading permits decreased informal entrepreneurship and informal trading by respectively 11.5 per cent and 9.6 per cent for those who were working in the informal sector. We investigate potential indirect effects on formal entrepreneurship, unemployment, and informal wage employment. The adoption of trading permits in the informal sector significantly increases the probability of being unemployed by 4.5 per cent and significantly decreases the probability of being informally employed by 15.5 per cent for those who were in the informal sector. The results suggest that a policy increasing the costs of informality might reduce informality but at the cost of rising unemployment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article investigates the factors that contributed to the proliferation of online COVID skepticism on Twitter across Italian municipalities in 2020. We demonstrate that sociodemographic factors were likely to mitigate the emergence of skepticism, whereas populist political leanings were more likely to foster it. Furthermore, pre-COVID anti-vaccine sentiment, represented by "old truthers" on Twitter, amplified online COVID skepticism in local communities. Additionally, exploiting the spatial variation in restrictive economic policies with severe implications for suspended workers in nonessential economic sectors, we find that COVID skepticism spreads more in municipalities significantly affected by the economic lockdown. Finally, the diffusion of COVID skepticism is positively associated with COVID vaccine hesitancy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The sustainability window approach began as a model that could explain the way to sustainable economic development. This theory places emphasis on ecological, economic and social linkages for making comprehensive analysis and policy towards United Nation's Sustainable Development Goals. It identifies four theoretically sustainable paths; two associated with economic growth and the others requiring growth conditional or strict adherence to environmental and social criteria. Many studies confirm that higher education institutions have not been able to completely embrace the concept of sustainability window approach. The paper asserts that these are the most effective ways through which global higher education establishments can achieve sustainability: well-being of society, environmental protection, low consumption, and limited social usage. Finally, it concludes by calling on high education institutions to incorporate sustainability window and integrate it with triple bottom line and responsible management education approaches. The paper argues that in order to determine whether such a change might be suitable in different settings, it is recommended that we test this revised framework using empirical evidence. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Managing a portfolio whose value closely tracks an index by trading only in a subset of the index constituents involves an NP-hard optimisation problem. In the prior literature, it has been suggested that this problem be solved using sequential Monte Carlo (SMC, also known as particle filter) methods. However, this literature does not take transaction costs into account, although transaction costs are the primary motivation for attempting to replicate the index by trading in a subset, rather than the full set of index constituents. This paper modifies the SMC approach to index tracking to allow for proportional transaction costs and implements this extended method on empirical data for a variety stock indices. In addition to providing a more practically useful tracking strategy by allowing for transaction costs, we find that including a penalty for transaction costs in the optimisation objective can actually lead to better tracking performance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores global implementation of capability building projects as part of an corporate lean programme. The aim is to identify the core parameters in global implementation of complex knowledge in various contexts within the corporation. The empirical research investigates the global implementation of a lean capability project in three regional clusters within a large pharmaceutical multinational production company. The findings indicate that contextual situations in regional clusters, for example, maturity levels, national culture, and previous experiences, influence the design of the implementation approaches embedding knowledge management principles in various ways. Three types of implementation approaches (horizontal, parallel, and delegated) are identified, which highlights the strategically different pathways to realise new frameworks for knowledge management. This study shows how adjustments to contextual situations influence the implementation process and identifies various hallenges with various approaches that may hinder the execution of lean strategy. This paper puts forward five identified implementation parameters that could guide future research and knowledge management practitioners in opex, HR, and learning and development functions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article proposes two new classes of nonparametric tests for the correct specification of linear spatial autoregressive models based on the "integrated conditional moment" approach. Our test statistics are constructed as continuous functionals of a residual marked empirical process as well as its projected version. We derive asymptotic properties of the test statistics under the null hypothesis, the alternative hypothesis, and a sequence of local alternatives. The proposed tests do not involve the selection of tuning parameters such as bandwidths and are able to detect a broad class of local alternatives converging to the null at the parametric rate n − 1 / 2 , with n being the sample size. We also propose a multiplier bootstrap procedure that is computationally simple to approximate the critical values. Monte Carlo simulations illustrate that our tests have a reasonable size and satisfactory power for different types of data-generating processes. Finally, an empirical analysis of growth convergence is carried out to demonstrate the usefulness of the tests. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Corporate makerspaces (CMSs) have gained attention from both academics and practitioners. The paper introduces the first empirically-tested CMS framework, describing elements and their impact on users and companies. A mixed-method approach triangulates data from (i) a semi-quantitative online survey among 22 CMS managers and users, (ii) in-depth, structured interviews with CMS managers from 11 manufacturing companies, and (iii) an observation study and desk research on CMSs of the interviewed companies. The study shows that CMSs typically include prototyping infrastructure, community infrastructure, and facilitation. CMSs impact users by supporting prototyping, creativity, experimentation, and knowledge sharing. CMSs have an additional effect on the company by increasing innovation culture, collaboration with external stakeholders, intrapreneurship, employee retention & attraction. Thus, this paper is beneficial for innovation and engineering management practitioners who have or plan to have a CMS and for academics who want to do further research on CMSs and innovation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Increasing numbers of commercial enterprises in the German-speaking countries are switching from the traditional formal Sie address for customers to the more casual du address. This article reports on a part of an interdisciplinary empirical study evaluating the effect that the address pronoun used towards the customer has on the perception of the salesperson. Respondents were shown short videos of sales encounters and asked to indicate their perception of the salesperson in a guided questionnaire. The choice of either du or Sie as the address pronoun used by the salesperson in the videos did not make a substantial difference to the way the salesperson was perceived by the respondent group as a whole, but some significant differences appeared within sub-cohorts, which were determined by the gender, age group and education level of respondents, and by the industries in which the videos that the respondents watched were set. The overwhelming majority of the significant differences in the perceptions of the salesperson according to the address pronoun used shows that the salesperson using Sie is seen in a more positive light. This suggests that, somewhat surprisingly and counterintuitively, addressing customers with du does not have the general effect of improving the perception of the salesperson. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article presents an empirical analysis of the non‐financial reporting of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) by a sample of 24 best‐in‐class companies across various sectors worldwide. The sample was selected based on a previous screening of SDG reporting by 1360 companies from 97 different countries that pointed to a superficial engagement with the SDGs for the vast majority of the firms (see Heras‐Saizarbitoria, 2022). Employing a qualitative approach to content analysis, this study sheds light on the specific issues related to SDGs and reported by the best‐in‐class companies. Implications for managers, public policymakers, and other stakeholders are also examined. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The expansion of e‐commerce has increased scholarly interest in Business‐to‐Customer (B2C) last‐mile delivery (LMD). LMD occurs in a unique logistical context and presents many new, evolving challenges worthy of scholarly investigation. While most LMD studies emerged after 2018, existing literature reviews predate the "boom." Current reviews have focused at the macro‐level, considering LMD secondarily within broad topics like omni‐channel or micro perspectives that address granular issues like transportation within LMD. The majority of studies have focused on analytical models that investigate different concerns compared to conceptual and empirical studies. Our study examines an up‐to‐date sample of 104 articles in LMD literature from a process, meso‐level perspective. We develop a framework, classifying studies around pre‐delivery, delivery, and post‐delivery activities that produce valuable insights linking these activities. We synthesize the prior literature and offer a research agenda that incorporates different stakeholder perspectives and identifies methodological opportunities. The analysis reveals several areas of future research that were validated and enhanced by practitioner interviews. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Logistics organizations' cultures inherently produce tension between safety and operational requirements. Perhaps counterintuitively, such tension is important for organizations to achieve safe practice and effective operational outcomes. In this study, we evaluate how logistics managers and workers create, identify, and manage various tensions between operational requirements and personnel health and safety during an extended period of uncertainty. Using a grounded theory (GT) approach, this research draws on multiple data sources from six global U.S. Air Force logistics organizations during the first year of the COVID‐19 pandemic. A six‐stage GT empirical analysis process revealed a tension‐centered approach to safe, effective logistics, presented as a substantive (middle‐range) theory with an accompanying process model. Data demonstrate operations‐ and people‐focused cultural elements are activated based on respective requirements, thus inducing tension between potentially competing, yet interrelated, areas. In high‐performing organizations, logistics managers and workers address tensions via a balanced focus to alleviate conflicts and conduct safe, effective logistics. This research responds to calls for organizational culture research using qualitative methods while offering implications for theory and practice. Specifically, logistics leaders can use the process model to prepare personnel to safely and effectively handle dynamic operational logistics in the face of unforeseen crises or changes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Based on the unique setting of small and medium-sized banks (SMBs) branching deregulation in China, this paper examines the impact of SMBs branches expansion on the credit availability of enterprises by using spatial distribution of SMBs branches at firm-level. We find that SMBs branches expansion has a stronger effect on improving the credit availability of large-scale enterprises compared with SMEs, indicating that SMBs don't give play to their advantages in serving SMEs. Our study provides empirical evidence for the hypothesis of 'Comparative Advantages of SMBs' and policy implication for the reform of banking structure. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article advances debates on the limits of judge-made law to palliate legislative failure to respond to changing practice. Canadian judges have adjusted the general private law to address the situation of unmarried cohabitants. In Kerr v Baranow, the Supreme Court of Canada continued its adaptation of unjust enrichment to this end. The article reports on the first empirical inquiry into how the judgment is operating, including outside the courtroom. Interviews with family lawyers in Quebec show that bringing claims under the adapted doctrine is complex and costly. Variable and unpredictable outcomes impede fair and efficient private ordering. Cohabitation agreements do not seem a satisfactory solution. The study highlights shortcomings in the leading Canadian judgment, which recognizes some cohabiting couples as partnerships but stops short of presuming an equal sharing of gains during the union. But, since the participating lawyers pointed to factors that would reduce the efficacy of reform by judges or by legislatures, the study does not yield a broad preference for legislative reform over judicial reform. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Globally, the issue of research impact has grown as governments articulate policies around research as a contributor to economic and societal development, often through an econometric justification. This has triggered much discussion amongst humanities scholars in public formally-reasoned peer-reviewed texts that are rarely empirically-based. This Denmark-based empirical study used an individual biographical and historical structural framework to explore how humanities academics in face-to-face semi-formal interactive interviews viewed this issue. The results highlighted a nuanced understanding of what we call the humanities-impact landscape, with three potential interactions falling along a continuum suggesting further inquiry is warranted. The study contributes a rich tapestry of the interwoven individual and structural elements at play when academics articulate how they locate themselves within the landscape, ones that might not be seen in more conceptual arguments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Petroleum Geology & Oilfield Development in Daqing is the property of Editorial Department of Petroleum Geology & Oilfield Development in Daqing and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Background: Maintaining a physically active lifestyle is a determinant factor of a healthy life and personal happiness. Meanwhile, physical inactivity remains a significant issue, resulting in negative consequences for public health. Objectives: This paper investigates the relationships between physical activity, physical inactivity, a healthy life, life expectancy, and personal happiness in European Union (EU) countries. Methods: This empirical study uses an artificial neural network and cluster analysis to analyze and interpret data from 27 EU countries. Artificial neural network analysis enables the assessment of the relationships between physical activity and inactivity, a healthy life, and personal happiness, while cluster analysis identifies groups of EU countries based on physical activity, healthy life, and personal happiness indicators. Results: The results show significant positive links between physical activity and improvements in healthy living and personal happiness. Conclusions: This study highlights considerable variations among EU countries regarding the levels of physical activity, healthy living, and personal happiness, emphasizing the importance of promoting physical activity to enhance public health and overall well-being. The findings suggest the need to develop customized policies that address country-specific factors and promote an active lifestyle. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Single-Source Shortest Paths (SSSP) graph problem is a fundamental computation. This study attempted to characterize concretely the energy behaviors of the two primary methods to solve it, the Bellman–Ford and Dijkstra algorithms. The very different interactions of the algorithms with the hardware may have significant implications for energy. The study was motivated by the multidisciplinary nature of the problem. Gaining better insights should help vital applications in many domains. The work used reliable embedded sensors in an HPC-class CPU to collect empirical data for a wide range of sizes for two graph cases: complete as an upper-bound case and moderately dense. The findings confirmed that Dijkstra's algorithm is drastically more energy efficient, as expected from its decisive time complexity advantage. In terms of power draw, however, Bellman–Ford had an advantage for sizes that fit in the upper parts of the memory hierarchy (up to 2.36 W on average), with a region of near parity in both power draw and total energy budgets. This result correlated with the interaction of lighter logic and graph footprint in memory with the Level 2 cache. It should be significant for applications that rely on solving a lot of small instances since Bellman–Ford is more general and is easier to implement. It also suggests implications for the design and parallelization of the algorithms when efficiency in power draw is in mind. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Teachers have difficulty integrating proof in their mathematics instruction due to both narrow beliefs about proofs and limited understanding of proofs. Indirect proofs seem to be a particular cause for concern. In this exploratory study, we contribute to the research area by reporting on an empirical study of Norwegian pre-service teachers' knowledge of and beliefs about direct and indirect proofs. Inspired by situativity theory, we investigated pre-service teachers' knowledge of and beliefs about proofs both professed generally and out-of-context and in situation-specific circumstances. Our initial findings are in line with much of the previous literature. First, for situation-specific beliefs and knowledge, we found that indirect proofs seem to be more challenging than direct proofs. Second, for general beliefs and knowledge, we found pre-service teachers' views about proofs in general are narrow and rigid. However, we also investigated possible patterns between general and situation-specific beliefs and knowledge. We found that participants who empirically validated proofs also professed views that a good mathematical argument is an argument that is simply convincing, and not necessarily rigorous. Second, participants who professed preferences for direct proofs, also struggled with the logical conditions of indirect proofs. Implications are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recent events, including COVID‐19, extreme floods, and explosion accidents, commonly induced localized closures and disruptions of urban road networks (URNs), resulting in significant impacts on human mobility and socio‐economic activities. Existing studies on URN resilience to those events mainly took few cases for empirical studies, limiting our understanding on the URN resilience patterns across different cities. By conducting a large‐scale nationwide resilience analysis of URNs in 363 cities in mainland China, this study attempts to uncover the resilience patterns of URNs against the worst‐case single (SLDs) and multiple localized disruptions (MLDs). Results show that the distance from the worst‐case SLD to the city center would be less than 5 km in 62.3% cities, as opposed to more than 15 km in 14.3% cities. Moreover, the average road network resilience of cities in western China could be 7% and 13% smaller than that of the eastern cities under the worst‐case SLDs and MLDs, respectively. This inequality in the worst‐case resilience is partly attributable to variations in urban socio‐economic, infrastructure‐related, and topographic factors. These findings could inspire nationwide pre‐disaster mitigation strategies to cope with localized disruptions and help transfer insights for mitigation strategies against disruptive events across cities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this article, I name and describe the field of institutional justice, which comprises all forms of child institutional abuse and neglect, related historical/policy wrongs, and responses to them. I argue that institutional justice requires its own theoretical framework, one not part of the empire of transitional justice (McAuliffe, 2011) and one true to its subject and capable of building a body of theorized empirical research. I present and discuss my theoretical framework, which draws from Derrida's (1992) conception of justice; research on transitional, historical, and institutional justice; and my international project on institutional justice. The framework's elements are justice as "a promise," victims' struggles and aspirations for justice (for recognition, truth, accountability, and redress), and the limits and unsettled qualities of justice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Offender accountability is a primary goal of restorative justice meetings. Yet existing research on restorative justice demonstrates wide variation in how accountability is defined in research and achieved in practice. Empirical research also shows offenders sometimes struggle with providing information or demonstrating culpability, and victims are sometimes not satisfied with offender accounts or view offenders as justifying their behavior. Toward these problems of "getting to accountability," we set forth a definition that is comprised of three phases – the giving, taking, and making of accountability – primary to how offenders demonstrate and how victims and others perceive accountability in restorative justice meetings. Following this, we discuss implications for research and practice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study is trying to address the critical need for efficient routing in Mobile Ad Hoc Networks (MANETs) from dynamic topologies that pose great challenges because of the mobility of nodes. The main objective was to delve into and refine the application of the Dijkstra's algorithm in this context, a method conventionally esteemed for its efficiency in static networks. Thus, this paper has carried out a comparative theoretical analysis with the Bellman-Ford algorithm, considering adaptation to the dynamic network conditions that are typical for MANETs. This paper has shown through detailed algorithmic analysis that Dijkstra's algorithm, when adapted for dynamic updates, yields a very workable solution to the problem of real-time routing in MANETs. The results indicate that with these changes, Dijkstra's algorithm performs much better computationally and 30% better in routing optimization than Bellman-Ford when working with configurations of sparse networks. The theoretical framework adapted, with the adaptation of the Dijkstra's algorithm for dynamically changing network topologies, is novel in this work and quite different from any traditional application. The adaptation should offer more efficient routing and less computational overhead, most apt in the limited resource environment of MANETs. Thus, from these findings, one may derive a conclusion that the proposed version of Dijkstra's algorithm is the best and most feasible choice of the routing protocol for MANETs given all pertinent key performance and resource consumption indicators and further that the proposed method offers a marked improvement over traditional methods. This paper, therefore, operationalizes the theoretical model into practical scenarios and also further research with empirical simulations to understand more about its operational effectiveness. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Corporate dividend policy is a puzzle, especially when considering the effects of economic and behavioural factors. We develop a theoretical analysis of corporate dividend policy in order to analyse the effects of the complex mix of managerial moral hazard, overconfidence, and myopia on managerial incentives to increase or decrease dividends. Furthermore, we consider the effect of investor irrationality that drives corporate dividend catering behaviour. We investigate how this complex mix of economic and behavioural factors is likely to affect dividend policy. Our analysis provides a deep theoretical underpinning to understanding these effects and provides a basis for future empirical research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The importance of video remote interpreting (VRI) for providing interpreting services has drastically increased over the last decade. Empirical research has shown, however, that interpreting through video link may have a significant impact on the interaction and the interpreting performance in dialogue interpreting contexts. The present study contributes to this growing field of research by focusing on interpreters' repair initiations in the context of VRI. Although repairs are an important mechanism for addressing problems in communication, very little research has been devoted to the study of interpreter-initiated repair in dialogue settings. Based on a corpus of video-recorded interpreted interactions (Dutch-Russian), where the interpreter is either present onsite or connected through video link, we analyse interpreters' repair initiations and related risk taking behaviour. More specifically, we examine how interpreters manage a specific type of repair initiations in video remote interpreting, namely postponed repairs. The analysis reveals differences in repair patterns between video remote and onsite interpreting and we propose that these differences result from differential risk management in the two settings. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates the effects of cigarette tax changes at different ages on long-term smoking behaviors. Using survey data on six decades of birth cohorts and a generalized difference-in-differences study design, I show that an increase in the cigarette tax at any age diminishes the long-term probabilities of smoking initiation and participation and reduces smoking intensity among people who currently smoke. These findings suggest that cigarette taxes prevent adults from beginning to smoke and cause people who smoke to promptly smoke less and quit over time. My estimates suggest that an average state tax hike applied to the national population would have caused over 400,000 people to quit smoking and prevented 4,000 deaths from smoking-related causes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines whether expanding Medicaid eligibility affects the employment patterns and academic progress of college students. To estimate causal relationships, we use variation in eligibility due to the Affordable Care Act Medicaid expansions that occurred in a subset of US states. Using data from the National Postsecondary Student Aid Study, we show that expanding Medicaid resulted in a decrease in employment intensity that is most pronounced for students at community colleges. We also see evidence of students making better progress towards graduation, suggesting that expanding Medicaid may have benefited some students by allowing them to shift their focus from work to school. These findings provide insight into how access to publicly provided health insurance can reduce inequalities in long-term education and socioeconomic outcomes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A test battery with two different levels of adaptation is presented: a within-subtest level for the selection of the items in the subtests and a between-subtest level to move from one subtest to the next. The battery runs on a two-level model consisting of a regular response model for each of the subtests extended with a second level for the joint distribution of their abilities. The presentation of the model is followed by an optimized MCMC algorithm to update the posterior distribution of each of its ability parameters, select the items to Bayesian optimality, and adaptively move from one subtest to the next. Thanks to extremely rapid convergence of the Markov chain and simple posterior calculations, the algorithm can be used in real-world applications without any noticeable latency. Finally, an empirical study with a battery of short diagnostic subtests is shown to yield score accuracies close to traditional one-level adaptive testing with subtests of double lengths. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This review focuses on empirical research about contemporary challenges to the death penalty in the United States. Challenges are factors that obstruct capital punishment, including legal or political restrictions; elimination at the federal or state level; or the hindrance of the process at its operational stages of charging, adjudicating, appeals, clemency, or executions. By the best-known measures, the death penalty has been in decline in the United States since the turn of the century. Lethal injection errors—"botches"—are arguably the most important current challenge to the institution. Wrongful capital conviction has made capital punishment less tolerable to the general public. Mitigation remains an important challenge to the death penalty. This review emphasizes botches, innocence, and mitigation but also touches on disparate impact, failure-to-deliver a social benefit, and cost. Along the way, this review proposes a framework for considering challenges as they occur on two continua of impact, a micro/meso/macro axis and a narrow/wide axis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although scholars have theoretically addressed how information from others can affect justice processes, little empirical research investigates how individuals make sense of a distributive injustice when also attending to other justice and legitimacy concerns. This research examines how legitimacy conditions emotional and behavioral responses to various forms of injustice associated with strain. Drawing from General Strain Theory (GST) and the social psychological literature on legitimacy and justice, I investigate how endorsement of a deviant response to injustice, while failing to support the perpetrator of injustice, influences negative affect and projected deviant coping in response to a distributively unjust blocked goal. A randomized vignette survey was distributed to a sample of undergraduates. Results reveal that legitimacy affects perceptions of justice and conditions the effect of unjust strain on negative affect and the likelihood of deviance, but only when certain types of injustice are present. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper develops a model to map out embodied movement as a stratified semiotic mode, that is, a conventionalized set of resources for meaning making. The model describes movement structure as a system that realizes specific meanings activated by contexts of situation. The model establishes an explicit link between contextual meanings and textual patterning by theorizing connections between genre, metafunction, and structure. Drawing upon an empirical study of one teacher’s embodied movement in the classroom, this paper maps out movement structure as distinct choices and reveals how movement, gaze and speech function rhythmically to construe information prominence and information boundaries at different levels of discourse organization, which further contributes to coherence and periodicity for the information flow and semantic flow in the lesson. Additionally, the paper reveals that the synthesis of different modes can enact semantic convergence and divergence to aggregate knowledge in pedagogic contexts. The analysis contributes to a systematic understanding of the types of meaning that embodied movement can realize and of the ways in which they are realized together with speech and gaze. The intertwined nature of movement structures, meanings and contexts also indicates that pedagogy is an embodied and situated construction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Since the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic, the excess mortality P-score has gained prominence as a measure of pandemic burden. The P-score indicates the percentage by which observed deaths deviate from expected deaths. As the P-score is regularly used to compare excess mortality between countries, questions arise regarding the age dependency of the measure. In this paper we present formal and empirical results on the population structure bias of the P-score with a special focus on cross-country comparisons during the COVID-19 pandemic in Europe. Methods: P-scores were calculated for European countries for 2021, 2022, and 2023 using data from the 2024 revision of the United Nations' World Population Prospects and the HMDs Short Term Mortality Fluctuations data series. The expected deaths for 2021, 2022, and 2023 were estimated using a Lee–Carter forecast model assuming pre-pandemic conditions. P-score differences between countries were decomposed using a Kitagawa-type decomposition into excess-mortality and structural components. To investigate the sensitivity of P-score cross-country rankings to differences in population structure we calculated the rank-correlation between age-standardized and classical P-scores. Results: The P-score is an average of age-specific percent excess deaths weighted by the age-distribution of expected deaths. It can be shown that the effect of differences in the distribution of deaths only plays a marginal role in a European comparison. In most cases, the excess mortality effect is the dominant effect. P-score rankings among European countries during the COVID-19 pandemic are similar under both age-standardized and classical P-scores. Conclusions: Although the P-score formally depends on the age-distribution of expected deaths, this structural component only plays a minor role in a European comparison, as the distribution of deaths across the continent is similar. Thus, the P-score is suitable as a measure of excess mortality in a European comparison, as it mainly reflects the differences in excess mortality. However, this finding should not be extrapolated to global comparisons, where countries could have very different death distributions. In situations were P-score comparisons are biased age-standardization can be applied as a solution. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper aims to (1) explore how notions about STEM in different contexts, times, scales and places affect STEM-practices in ECE and beyond, and (2) with this as a point of departure, highlight the need and potential of using feminist perspectives and a feminist pedagogy in STEM-related courses within ECTE (Early Childhood Teacher Education). To explore the aim, I experiment with diffractive readings of agential cuts made from the STEM-area; theoretical and empirical research papers, a popular-scientific book, reports, surveys and statistics and a field study in preschool. The findings highlight that feminist perspectives and a feminist pedagogy are important for all ECTE students, irrespective of earlier experiences of and feelings towards STEM (e.g. fun/difficult, insecure/confident). They are also of importance for all children since notions of what STEM is/is not and who is interested in STEM/not interested, risk to affect all children’s STEM-learning in narrowing ways irrespective of gender. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper provides an evidence-based study that evaluates the attitudes of Panjabi speakers in the Panjab region towards the Panjabi language, exploring the underlying reasons shaping those attitudes. Panjabi language activists have expressed concerns about the challenges confronting the language and its vitality. However, due to a noticeable absence of any empirical data these concerns often become entangled in a discourse, questioning the authenticity and reliability of these concerns. This paper, therefore, aims to measure the realistic standing and situation of the language, by undertaking the first, empirical study across nine districts in Panjab, India. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Taking as a starting point the growing body of scholarship on movement parties of the far right, this research note undertakes a reflection on the boundaries of the movement party concept from two distinct angles – the established interactive‐mobilisational approach and the more recent discursive‐organisational one – and their empirical implications for the study of far‐right movement parties in Europe today. While the former approach's emphasis on the hybridity of electoral and protest‐based collective action repertoires as the primary defining feature of movement parties suggests a wide‐ranging applicability of the concept to the far right, the latter approach's understanding of the movement party as a specific organisational type based on horizontal coordinative links between constituent movements via collective leadership structures appears to pull in the opposite direction. These differences are explored in an overview of three far‐right parties that fit both movement party definitions to varying degrees – CasaPound in Italy, Right Sector in Ukraine, and Konfederacja in Poland – followed by a discussion of the Alternative for Germany (AfD) as an ambivalent case that prototypically fits the interactive‐mobilisational understanding but falls short of the discursive‐organisational one, thus magnifying the conceptual differences between the two approaches. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This manuscript presents a comprehensive investigation into the tensile strength and flexural behavior of steel fiber‐reinforced concrete (SFRC), utilizing a robust dataset comprising 457 meticulously selected data points, including 54 instances of self‐tested experimental data. The study establishes an empirical relationship governing the tensile strength of steel fiber concrete (SFC) based on the fiber reinforcement index (FRI) and the grade of concrete. The experimental study has extended its scope by testing an additional 27 full‐scale SFRC beams (rectangular cross‐sectioned) under monotonic loading to quantify the impact of tensile strength on the overall structural performance. The beam specimens feature continuous longitudinal and transverse reinforcement throughout their span, with steel fibers strategically positioned below the neutral axis. The steel fiber content was systematically varied from 0% to 2% in intervals of 0.25%. This work introduces modifications to the design of SFRC flexural members, emphasizing the consideration of tensile contribution below the neutral axis. The study integrates both experimental and analytical methodologies, providing diverse insights into the flexural behavior of SFRC beams. The proposed design methodology considers the tensile strength contribution from SFC, effectively predicting flexural capacity, particularly in scenarios involving higher volume fractions. Its applicability extends to structural design, offering insights into evaluating structural capacity for both newly designed and existing structures. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

For complex and socially contentious environmental issues, such as climate change and disease prevention, science communication has proven difficult. As many science communication scholars have determined, education is not the only factor impacting the public's willingness to act upon or even accept scientific information. In this study, we propose using Niklas Luhmann's theory of social systems as a framework for research in science and environmental communication. We argue that by focusing on the functions of relevant social systems, the occurrence of communication conflicts may be explained, and new approaches to overcome communication obstacles can be developed. In this study, we provide examples of the theory's utility by looking at pertinent studies regarding relevant systems integral to addressing climate change and sustainability issues, as well as propose new subjects for exploration. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Media narratives employed in contemporary journalism, including data journalism, are critical in shaping public understanding of the complex systems that affect our lives. Depicting a chain of events in a "story" format, narratives are constructed with detailed, precise, and well-researched information based on character identification, human emotions, and real social problems. In many ways, they are indispensable intermediaries of practiced judgment and expertise that guide the public to meaningfully engage with evidence-based understanding of our world and how we can act upon it. DMDU narratives suggest that we can act to shape the future toward our liking even when we cannot predict what that future will be, that we need to simultaneously consider multiple rather than a single future, and that the quest for prediction can interfere with the task of identifying the best actions. DMDU practice relies on substantive stakeholder interaction, and it is supported by vast amounts of empirical evidence. This perspective discusses how media narratives intersect with DMDU to informand to leverage the complexities ofmodern contemporary public challenges. We first explore how uncertainty might be actionable, as opposed to fearful. Next, while acknowledging limitations on transference of information during the journalistic process, we address the challenges and best strategies to distill information to the public to maintain and build trust about uncertainty. Next, we discuss how journalistic practices could be useful for disseminating more broadly findings of DMDU analyses. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article recounts 6 years of empirical research in a humanitarian context on spatial behaviour using the behaviour settings theory. This research journey details the shortcomings of conventional architectural processes and the subsequent development of a human-centred behaviour setting methodology that drives behaviour change for adaptable spaces. The research work puts Barker's theory of behaviour settings into practice to show its significant methodological abilities in shaping behaviours through spaces. While the original theory was solely an analytical account of existing behaviours in certain settings, this study marks the first pragmatic exploration of the theory into both residential and refugee contexts. The methodology that is subsequently proposed is a complementary tool to account for the deficiencies of conventional architectural design processes. A method that enables one to fully immerse themselves in the environment, recognize specific architectural interventions, assess their effects and reiterate. It is a proposal for humanizing architecture, sympathizing its processes and personalizing its results for the users of any space. This article is part of the theme issue 'People, places, things, and communities: expanding behaviour settings theory in the twenty-first century'. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study conducted a systematic review of empirical research to examine the effectiveness of professional development (PD) programmes aimed at promoting playful learning pedagogies among early childhood teachers. Despite the growing adoption of policies advocating for playful learning, a considerable disparity persists between policy ideals, research findings, and actual instructional practices. This study identified a scarcity of rigorous research on this topic, with nine qualifying studies showcasing nine distinct PD programmes, each characterised by diverse training delivery methods, intensity levels, and playful learning conceptualisations. While these programmes reported enhancements in teachers’ playful learning pedagogies, predominantly through reflection and coaching strategies, the lack of rigorous research methodologies employed in the studies hinders definitive conclusions about optimal practices and significant impacts on teacher practices and student outcomes. It is recommended that playful learning PD programmes integrate research findings from the science of learning, embrace community and cultural values as an integral part, and incorporate both reflection and coaching strategies to bridge the gap between policy, research, and pedagogical implementation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The current era is characterized by an increase in variability, which merits attention with regard to its influence on the perception of social justice. This study investigated the effects of variability and its positive or negative qualities on social justice perception. This was achieved through the pre-experimental preparation of materials and formal experimental manipulation. Participants were randomly assigned to one of four conditions: high variability—positive, low variability—positive, high variability—negative, and low variability—negative. The results suggest that (1) variability significantly affects social justice perception, which means that social justice perception is greater in high-variability conditions than in low-variability conditions; (2) the quality of variability does not have an independent effect on social justice perception, but there is an interaction; and (3) in low variability—negative conditions, the social justice perception is lowest. The current study provides an empirical basis for understanding people's perceptions of social justice in the context of great change. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Complex products and systems (CoPS) development demands effective risk management, which is frequently impeded by a lack of clarity regarding the impact of risks on performance. This study aims to investigate how multiple risks jointly affect innovation performance in CoPS projects. Based on the configurational theory and WSR framework, we use fuzzy set qualitative comparative analysis (fsQCA) with data from 97 CoPS projects and examine the combined effects of risks on innovation performance. We identify two types leading to high innovation performance and four patterns causing low innovation performance. The results verify the asymmetrical causality of the influence of risks on innovation performance in CoPS projects. The findings contribute to broadening the relationship studies of risk and innovation performance by adopting an empirical method in the context of CoPS. Moreover, our study can help managers implement flexible risk management activities within CoPS projects, by addressing several equivalent and distinctive paths. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Inequalities are obtained which connect the probability tails and moments of functions of the nth partial sums of independent random variables taking values in a separable Banach space and those for the accompanying infinitely divisible laws. Some applications to empirical processes are studied. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This empirical study investigates the structural relationships among virtual influencer attributes, perceived creepiness, perceived authenticity, emotional attachment, and word-of-mouth intentions of social media users. To be specific, this study conceptually identifies the roles of the virtual influencer attributes of language similarity, interest similarity, social attractiveness, physical attractiveness, and attitude homophily on perceived creepiness and perceived authenticity of the virtual influencer, as these in turn affect emotional attachment and word-of-mouth. This study collected data from social media users in the United States via a survey approach and found that creepiness was significantly influenced by attitude homophily while perceived authenticity was significantly affected by language similarity, interest similarity, physical attractiveness, and attitude homophily. In addition, this study found significant relationships among perceived creepiness, perceived authenticity, emotional attachment, and word-of-mouth intention. This empirical study has both theoretical and practical implications for virtual influencer marketing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]