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This rapid review found an absence of literature focused specifically on measuring the impact of PFM and governance systems in countries that have transitioned from aid, by moving up the income ladder. However, there are a few academic publications and a limited number of studies by multilateral, such as the World Bank, that examine the role of PFM and governance systems in countries that are transitioning or have moved away from aid. However, the importance of public financial management (PFM) and governance systems in development is well established and seen as a pre-requisite for economic growth. To effectively transition from aid, most low-income countries (LICs) need to upgrade their PFM and governance systems to meet the different scale, resources, accountability mechanisms, and capacity-building requirements of a middle-income country (MIC). The absence of the above empirical evidence may be due to the complexity of measuring the impact of PFM reforms as the results are non-linear, difficult to isolate from other policies to establish causality, and manifest in a longer time frame. However, through comparative country studies, the consequences of deficient PFM and governance have been well documented. So impaired budgetary planning, implementation, and reporting, limited fiscal transparency, weak accountability mechanisms, resource leakage, and inefficient service delivery are well recognised as detrimental to economic growth and development. The literature on transitioning countries focuses predominantly on the impact of aid withdrawal on the social sector, where comparative qualitative data is easier to obtain and the effects are usually more immediate, visible, and may even extend to global health outcomes, such as in AIDS prevention programmes. Thus, tracking the progress of donor-assisted social sector programmes is relatively easier than for PFM and governance reforms. The literature is more abundant on the overall lessons of transitions from aid both for country governments and donors. The key lessons underscore the importance of PFM and governance systems and mechanisms to a successful transition up the income ladder: Planning for transition should be strategic, detailed and specifically geared to mitigate against risks, explicitly assessing the best mix of finance options to mitigate the impact of aid reduction/withdrawal on national budgets. The plan must be led by a working group or ministry and have timelines and milestones; Where PFM and governance is weak transition preparation should include strengthening PFM especially economic and fiscal legislation, administration, and implementation; Stakeholders such as donor partners (DPs) and NGOs should participate in the planning process with clear, open, and ongoing communication channels; Political and economic assessments in the planning and mid-term phases as well as long-term monitoring and evaluation should be instituted; Build financial, technical, and management capacity throughout the plan implementation This helpdesk report draws on academic, policy, and grey sources from the previous seven years rather than the usual K4D five-year window, to account for the two-year disruption of COVID-19. As cross-country studies on PFM and governance are scarce, a few older studies are also referenced to ensure a comprehensive response to the query. The report focuses on low-income countries transitioning from aid due to a change in status to lower-middle-income countries.

The aim of adaptive programming (AP) is to produce adaptive, flexible, iterative, responsive, problem-driven, politically smart, locally led programmes which are effective and efficient and meet donor requirements for accountability. This is a rapid desk review of recent literature on AP including academic and grey sources. Section 2 covers the main challenges and barriers to successful implementation of AP. Key success factors are covered in Section 3. Selecting the appropriate monitoring and evaluation tools such as outcome harvesting or adapted versions of Value for Money to assist in measuring outcomes and embedding learning is key to successful AP, particularly in governance programmes, where results are usually long-term, non-linear and causality can be difficult to specifically trace back to the donor-funded intervention. Section 4 details three case studies from the governance arena as this report was requested to assist in designing adaptive governance programmes. Thus, the State Accountability and Voice Initiative (SAVI) from Nigeria, Chakua Hatua from Tanzania, and Within and Without the State (WWS) from conflict regions are included to show how flexible indicators, donor communication and negotiation, empowering teams and adopting monitoring and evaluation tools assisted in successful AP outcomes in different locations and political contexts. The challenges faced and drawbacks of certain processes were fed into efficient feedback loops fostering cross-communication, adaptation, and modification to ensure procedures and policies were changed accordingly. Sources used are primarily from the previous 5 years, as per K4D norms, unless the work is seminal, such as the ODI Report (2016) Doing Development Differently, which encouraged over 60 countries to sign up for the AP methodology. This review found a substantive body of literature on AP methodology the relative recency of academic attention on AP in the development less evidence is available on case studies of AP in the development sector, as there are not many ongoing projects and even fewer have been completed and results assessed (ICF, 2019). There is also a lack of case studies on how dynamic, empowered, innovative teams successfully apply adaptive programming ideas, particularly providing behavioural insights about such teams (Cooke, 2017) as well as little attention to precipitating and sustaining behaviour change in institutions over the longer term (Power, 2017).

OBJECTIVE Over the last two decades, Western society has undergone a marked cultural transformation characterized by rising individualism. Concurrently, the digital landscape has transformed through the rise of social media and smartphones. These factors have previously been implicated in changing individuals' attitudes, behavior, and interpersonal interactions. We investigated whether these societal changes have coincided with changes in trait emotional intelligence (EI) over the last 17 years in Western university students. METHOD We examined this question using a cross-temporal meta-analysis (k = 70; N = 16,917). RESULTS There was no change in overall trait EI; however, the trait EI domains "well-being," "self-control," and "emotionality" demonstrated significant decreases with time, after controlling for gender composition and between-country differences. CONCLUSION We discuss these findings in relation to how they contribute to our understanding of trait EI, and how they add to the literature on how Western society is changing with time.

Moldova’s politics, economy, justice system and media are increasingly dominated by a powerful group of elites, led by oligarchs - a new breed of businessmen-politicians who have emerged in the past decade - controlling strategic sectors of the economy and finance, hijacking the political system, taming the judiciary and acquiring monopolistic control of mass media, to promote and protect their vast business empires. Alongside traditional clan, kinship and patronage networks these elites exert influence through informal politics , shaping Moldova’s politics and economy, often hindering reforms for democratisation, rule of law, meritocracy and transparency. This helpdesk report looks at the nature and role of clans in Moldova in the country’s politics and economy. This literature review utilises academic as well as grey sources, research papers, media and blogs published mainly in the past ten years. The sources reveal a paucity of Moldova centric material, especially on the sub-issue of clans, but much more literature is available on the role of informal politics and state capture by elites, especially oligarchs, in Moldova. The evidence found did not address gender and disability issues.

In modern warfare, the first widely acknowledged scientific study and documented case of environmental damage during conflict was the (direct and deliberate) use of Agent Orange and other toxic chemicals by US forces, from 1961-1971, during the Vietnam War in a policy known as herbicide. The Vietnam War has been relatively well documented for the sheer horror and magnitude of the devastation to natural habitats and because it was the first war where television and global media brought vivid images and accounts into people’s homes, making the war a matter of political and public conscience This helped stir academic and scientific interest and facilitated evidence collection and documentation of environmental damages. This helpdesk report is a rapid literature review on the main environmental impacts of war and conflict, drawing primarily on academic, and peer reviewed literature and only some policy and practitioner sources, as per the request. Where current situations are discussed, such as the ongoing Ukraine war, a few blogs are referred to. Within the literature focused on the environmental impacts of conflict, common case studies include: the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) bombing of Kosovo (1999), and the conflict in the Donbas region of Ukraine (2014). Interestingly there is comparatively less literature on the conflicts in Afghanistan (2001-2021), the Iraq-Iran War (1980-1988), the Gulf Wars (1991 and 2003), the Yemeni civil war (2014 – present) and the ongoing war in Syria (since 2011) despite their relatively greater severity, intensity and duration.

This article examines research performance of management academics in the Group of Eight (Go8) Australian universities using SCOPUS publication data. Normative research profiles for journal publications, book publications, citations, and h-index are provided for each academic level. The number of journal publications are reported for seven different journal ranking lists. The average Go8 management scholar increases the number of total journal publications per year by 56% over their entire publishing career, but does not increase the number of top international journal publications per year. Importantly, the top quartile of Go8 management scholars – who account for 70% of top journal publications and 79% of journal citations – already achieve world class productivity in the top international journals. We hope Go8 Deans and Heads of School use the research performance benchmarks to inform faculty recruitment, tenure and promotion decisions. JEL Classification: I23, M1, M19

Tandem repeat expansions (TREs) can cause neurological diseases but their impact in schizophrenia is unclear. Here we analyzed genome sequences of adults with schizophrenia and found that they have a higher burden of TREs that are near exons and rare in the general population, compared with non-psychiatric controls. These TREs are disproportionately found at loci known to be associated with schizophrenia from genome-wide association studies, in individuals with clinically-relevant genetic variants at other schizophrenia loci, and in families where multiple individuals have schizophrenia. We showed that rare TREs in schizophrenia may impact synaptic functions by disrupting the splicing process of their associated genes in a loss-of-function manner. Our findings support the involvement of genome-wide rare TREs in the polygenic nature of schizophrenia.

Tandem repeat expansions (TREs) can cause neurological diseases but their impact in schizophrenia is unclear. Here we analyzed genome sequences of adults with schizophrenia and found that they have a higher burden of TREs that are near exons and rare in the general population, compared with non-psychiatric controls. These TREs are disproportionately found at loci known to be associated with schizophrenia from genome-wide association studies, in individuals with clinically-relevant genetic variants at other schizophrenia loci, and in families where multiple individuals have schizophrenia. Our findings support the involvement of genome-wide rare TREs in the polygenic nature of schizophrenia.

Objective: Over the last two decades, Western society has undergone a marked cultural transformation characterised by rising individualism. Concurrently, the digital landscape has transformed through the rise of social media and smartphones. These factors have previously been implicated in changing individuals’ attitudes, behaviour and interpersonal interactions. We investigated whether these societal changes have coincided with changes in trait emotional intelligence (EI) over the last 17 years in Western university students. Method: We examined this question using a cross-temporal meta-analysis (k = 70; N = 16,917). Results: There was no change in overall trait EI; however, the trait EI domains “wellbeing,” “self-control” and “emotionality” demonstrated significant decreases with time, after controlling for gender composition and between-country differences. Conclusion: We discuss these findings in relation to how they contribute to our understanding of trait EI, and how they add to the literature on how Western society is changing with time.

SummaryFAN1 nuclease is a modifier of repeat expansion diseases, including Huntington’s disease (HD), fragile X syndrome, and autism. The age of HD onset correlates with ongoing ‘inchworm-like’ repeat expansions (1-3 CAG units/event) in HD brains, and is regulated by three modifiers: The first two, repeat tract length and purity exert their effects by enhancing and slowing CAG expansions, respectively, by affecting the formation of slipped-DNAs — mutagenic intermediates of instability; which are processed to expansions by the third modifiers, DNA repair proteins. FAN1 protects against hyper-expansions of repeats, by unknown mechanisms. We show FAN1, through iterative cycles bound, dimerized and cleaved slipped-DNAs, yielding striking patterns of distinct exo-nuclease pauses along slip-outs; 5′-C↓A↓GC↓A↓G-3′ and 5′-C↓T↓G↓C↓T↓G-3′. The transcriptionally-displaced CAG strand was excised slower than its complementary CTG strand, required A•A and T•T mismatches, as fully-paired hairpins arrested excision progression, while disease-delaying CAA interruptions further slowed FAN1 excision. In contrast, endo-nucleolytic cleavage was insensitive to slip-outs. Rare FAN1 variants were found in autism individuals with CGG/CCG repeat expansions. Excision of CGG/CCG slip-outs were similarly excised, with CGG being slower than CCG. The slip-out specific ligand, Naphthyridine-Azaquinolone, shown to induce contractions of expanded repeats in cells, required FAN1 for its effect, and protected slip-outs from FAN1’s exo- but not endo-nucleolytic digestion. FAN1’s ‘inchworm’ pausing of slip-out excision is suited to minimize incremental expansions and modulating disease onset.

This article reviews work and employment research, paying particular attention to theory and applications by scholars in organizational psychology and organizational behavior (OP/OB) and employment or industrial relations (ER), with the objective of better understanding employee and labor-management relationships. Our animating premise is that juxtaposing these two research traditions provides a stronger basis for analyzing these relationships today. OP/OB offer micro- and meso-level focuses, whereas ER focuses on organizations, collective actors, and labor markets, with an emphasis on historical context. We hope this review motivates efforts to think about and build new social and psychological contracts that are attuned to the evolving dynamics present in the economy, workforce, and society. To this end, we look to the future and propose ways of deepening, broadening, and accelerating the pace of research that might lead to useful changes in practices, institutions, and public policies.

Pharmaceutical excipients have gained a great importance due to their control of blood glucose level and sugar alternative. Thermodynamic methods provide an easy way for determination of solute-solute and solute-solvent interactions in solutions. Density and sound velocity for sugar alcohols have been measured in binary mixtures of Dimethyl Sulfoxide-Water at different percentage compositions (i.e. 10%–50%) at different temperatures. Density and sound velocity data have been used to calculate apparent molal volume, apparent molal isentropic compressibility, partial molal volume, partial molal isentropic compressibility, intermolecular free length, relative association, Rao's molar sound function and solvation number. Results have been discussed in terms of solvent-solvent, solute-solute and solvent-solute interactions. For all the systems studied, the density, sound velocity and apparent molal volume increase with increasing concentration of sugar alcohols which indicates the presence of solute-solvent interactions. The value of partial molal volume also increases with increasing temperature. The values of S v are found positive while the values of apparent molal isentropic compressibility are negative which indicates the presence of solute-solvent interactions.

Emotional intelligence is likely to change across the lifespan due to variations in intelligence, physiology, motivation and the accumulation of experiences. As such, we hypothesized that there wou...

Studies of job performance trajectories have demonstrated that job performance initially increases, plateaus and then eventually declines (Hofmann, Jacobs & Gerras, 1992). A major factor that may b...