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A critical assessment of the ever-expansive realm of party autonomy under Article 25 of Brussels I (recast)
No full textMitigating technology gaps' contribution to international income inequality
Get PDFThis replication study revisits a 2023 analysis by Sampson on the impact of international technology gaps on income inequality, trade, and wages. We extend the original framework by using broader patent metrics from PATSTAT, expanding the country sample and time frame, and testing alternative calibrations. Our results confirm that cross-country differences in innovation efficiency contribute significantly to wage and income disparities. However, the strength of this relationship varies with country composition and the choice of innovation measure. Broader patent indicators yield weaker inequality effects, highlighting the importance of measurement choices in assessing technology's role in global income distribution
The Joint Attention Grouping Effect:Perceptual Binding of Observed Social Interactions
Get PDFThe visual system may perceptually process conspecifics more efficiently when they are interacting, versus not, to support social cognitive functions such as group detection. In three experiments, young adult university students were briefly shown dyads (upright or inverted) and made speeded judgments of whether they attended the same location (joint attention) or different locations (non-joint attention). Participants performed worse with inverted stimuli, but this inversion effect was smaller in joint attention conditions. These findings indicate perceptual grouping of joint attention dyads into a single perceptual unit. This joint attention grouping effect was evident when dyads looked towards spatial locations (Experiment 1), towards objects (Experiment 2), and for asymmetrically composed stimuli (Experiment 3). The effect was weaker for non-social directional stimuli (Experiment 1). These data support the idea that two interacting individuals are coded as one socially bound perceptual unit, supporting efficient and rapid social cognitive computations
Sentence comprehension in Malay-speaking adults with aphasia: The role of affix integration
Get PDFBackground: One of the impairments in comprehension mostly reported for aphasia is that in reversible passive sentences, where a systematic asymmetry with reversible active sentences has been attested across languages. In several accounts, this selective impairment has been proposed to be the result of the specific syntax of passive sentences. However, some results particularly from flexible word order languages suggest that a pattern where both active and passive sentences are impaired also exists. Aims: In this study, we examined the actives and passives in the comprehension of a flexible word order language, namely standard Malay, in people with aphasia (PWA), aiming to confirm that the predominant pattern in this language is one of generalised impairment across reversible sentences (active and passive), and not an asymmetrical one. The role of fluency in determining the pattern of impairment was also explored. Methods & procedures: Fourteen healthy adults and 20 PWA, 14 with fluent aphasia and 6 with non-fluent aphasia, took part in a comprehension study in standard Malay. Standard Malay is a flexible word order language that relies on the parsing of the voice affix on the verb to correctly interpret both active and passive sentences. Participants were tested on a sentence-picture matching task on comprehension of active and passive reversible clauses. Outcomes and results: The study revealed that PWA were overall less accurate than healthy speakers in comprehension of reversible active and passive sentences, and non-fluent PWA were less accurate than fluent PWA with no effect of sentence type (active/passive). While not predominant, an asymmetric pattern was present in some participants. We propose that an impairment in thematic role assignment leads to a generalised impairment in comprehension of reversible sentences, while preserved thematic role mapping and impaired syntax lead to an asymmetric impairment. Conclusions: The study confirmed that speakers of Malay mostly show a generalised impairment in both active and passive sentences. Given the nature of the language, we propose that this suggests that impairment in Malay is predominantly shown on affix integration, first in mapping of thematic roles, and then in the full syntactic processing
Towards blockchain-enabled circular closed-loop supply chain and impact of consumers’ distrust in price, product greenness sensitivity and carbon tax and subsidy
Get PDFWith the increasing emphasis on environmental sustainability, both governments and consumers are more concerned than ever about the greenness of products. In this complex landscape, Supply Chains (SCs) face challenges in building trust and avoiding greenwashing accusations. Blockchain technology offers a promising solution by ensuring transparency and circularity within SCs, particularly in identifying customers for product recycling. This study pioneers the exploration of consumers' distrust in pricing and product greenness, alongside the impact of carbon policies (taxes and subsidies) within a closed-loop supply chain (CLSC). Using classical Stackelberg game theory, we develop two models that identify equilibrium decisions for SC members, focusing on pricing, green production investment, circularity, and blockchain adoption. Additionally, we propose an evolutionary game theory model to find the optimal government policies and identify the long-term behaviour of the CLSC and government in two heterogeneous populations. Our findings reveal that if the retailer's share of blockchain costs falls below a certain threshold, blockchain adoption becomes less profitable than exclusive investment in green production. A higher (lower) subsidy rate benefits (harms) the retailer but disadvantages (benefits) the collector. Blockchain adoption is generally more profitable for manufacturers and retailers, though less so for collectors, and it also drives greater investment in green production. While subsidies encourage blockchain adoption, they are not a sustainable long-term strategy for governments. Ultimately, the evolutionarily stable strategy for SCs involves a balanced investment in both green production and blockchain or green production alone, depending on market characteristics and cost-sharing structures
Dissociating effects of gaze direction and facial motion on memory of dynamic faces
No full textResearch on dynamic face processing often emphasizes facial movements while overlooking how social information conveyed by moving faces influences face perception and memory. Our study investigated how eye gaze, a critical social cue, affects the memory of dynamic faces and whether the effect generalizes across facial motion (e.g., rigid and elastic motion) and own- and other-race faces. We employed a recognition memory task across three experiments to address these questions. Experiment 1 compared memory following learning static or moving faces and showed better memory for static and elastically moving faces (i.e., with a direct gaze) than for rigidly moving faces (i.e., with varying gaze directions), more so for own- than other-race faces. Experiment 2 manipulated gaze direction in both elastic and rigid facial motion (i.e., direct vs. averted) and showed a direct-gaze advantage. Learning direct-gaze faces, with either rigid or elastic facial motion, produced consistently better memory performance than that after learning averted-gaze faces, which was more pronounced for own-race faces. Experiment 3 manipulated the congruency of gaze direction between learning and test phases for both rigid and elastic facial motion. The advantage of learning direct-gaze faces persisted, irrespective of gaze congruency between study and test faces. These results not only demonstrate the crucial role of social signals, like eye gaze, in face memory but also dissociate the influences of facial motion and its accompanying gaze directions on the memory of dynamic faces, which may help reconcile discrepant findings regarding the effect of facial motion on face perception and recognition
Polar Lows
No full textPolar lows are subsynoptic-scale cyclones that develop over the polar and subpolar seas, poleward of the main polar front. They are typically less than 1000 km in scale and last just 12–48 hours, although can have associated surface wind speeds of over 30 m s−1 (60 knots). Polar lows are the most intense variety of polar mesoscale cyclones—systems that are ubiquitous in winter. The small size, transient lifecycle and geographic location of these cyclones makes them difficult to observe and forecast, therefore a maritime hazard. The occurrence of polar lows is influenced by environmental conditions and is expected to decline in the future
Precise oil debris detection using a four-coil inductive sensor with compensation circuit and Wiener filtering
No full textTo mitigate the issues including structural asymmetry, high background noise, and environmental interference in the design of traditional inductive oil debris sensors for structural defect inspection, this study presents an innovative four-coil inductive sensor, which synergizes a voltage mutual inductance compensation circuit and a cyclic sampling Wiener filtering algorithm to improve the signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) in debris detection. Experimental results show that the proposed approach enhances the SNR originated from the structural, hardware, and algorithm perspectives, achieving improvements of 6.02 dB, 5.66 dB, and 9.89 dB, respectively. This novel inductive sensor with remarkable features demonstrates high efficiency in detecting small-scale debris and offers potential in substantial applications for oil debris detection and equipment maintenance in the field of structural health monitoring
Vibrio vulnificus epidemiology and risk factors for mortality in the United States, 2000-2022
No full textBackground: Vibrio vulnificus is a foodborne and waterborne pathogen causing substantial morbidity and mortality; however, its epidemiology remains poorly understood. To inform prevention and control efforts, we characterized U.S. V. vulnificus epidemiology and identified risk factors for mortality. Methods: For all culture-confirmed V. vulnificus cases reported to the Cholera and Other Vibrio Illness Surveillance (COVIS) system from 2000 to 2022, patient characteristics and medical outcomes were described by foodborne vs. non-foodborne transmission routes. Risk factors for mortality were identified using multivariate logistic regression. Results: Two thousand nine hundred and eighty-nine V. vulnificus cases were reported from 2000 to 2022, including 656 (22%) foodborne and 1,619 (54%) non-foodborne cases. Five-year case total increased 70% from 2000–2004 (n = 487) to 2018–2022 (n = 827). Most patients were male, older and White, with reported underlying health conditions; 2,493 (83%) patients were hospitalized and 692 (23%) died. Number of deaths (260 vs. 200) and fatality rate (40% vs. 12%) were higher among foodborne vs. non-foodborne cases. Mortality was associated with history of liver disease/alcoholism (odds ratio (OR) = 6.5, p 3 times higher fatality rate. Identifying risk factors for mortality can inform public health and medical interventions