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Gender Inequality as a Barrier for Climate Mitigation: Evidence from Emerging Markets
No full textM.P.P.The March 2023 report by Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has called for strict action against climate change, with the world approaching “irreversible levels” of global warming. Theoretically, women have been known to have greater affinity towards environmental conservation due to their inherent caregiving nature and because adverse weather events impact women and children disproportionately more than men. For these reasons, global leaders and humanitarian experts have called for greater female engagement in climate policymaking. These ideologies beg the question of why women are not at the forefront of the climate crisis yet. To answer this question empirically, I use the World Bank Enterprise Survey datasets of thirty-eight emerging markets from years 2019 to 2021 to study the correlation between a composite index of sustainable measures adoption and female managers. While the relationship was counterintuitive (negative and significant), I verified that female CEOs have little access to external finance and face a greater number of institutional bottlenecks. This, in turn, prohibited their increased participation in climate-conscious decision-making. Importantly, I interpret these findings as a sign of inherent gender bias and discriminatory societal norms holding women back in implementing climate-friendly business decisions. The results call for increased awareness of female empowerment, as a way to promote corporate environmental responsibility and stringent action against climate change
A Qualitative Study of Combat Veterans’ Experience Negotiating Individual and Institutional Identity Following the U.S. Withdrawal from Afghanistan
No full textM.A.In an effort to improve veterans institutional experience and experience transitioning away from their institution this research interviewed 14 individuals who served in Afghanistan on behalf of the U.S. government between 2001 and 2021. This informed grounded theory study was designed to gain a better understanding of veterans' relationships to the military or government institution and to the external institutions before, during, and after their time in Afghanistan, with a particular focus on subjects relationship with the media and experiences with U.S. media coverage of the withdrawal from Afghanistan.This research found that, in the course of the War in Afghanistan, shifting external narratives grew to be at odds with the institutional myths of combat and therefore created tensions among the identity negotiations among veterans. This tension was exacerbated because those external narratives affirmed the lived experience of veterans.This research implies that the tension generated by conflicting institutional narratives (internal and external) create social and psychological challenges for the institutional members and undermine institutional structure and function. The social shield that was constructed around many veteran identities, i.e. that they served their country for the greater good, eroded and the burden of meaningful justification for war fell to the individual rather than the institution
The Patient Experience: Medicare Payor Type and Beneficiary Satisfaction
No full textM.P.P.As Medicare spending continues to increase, especially as the baby boomer generation fully ages into eligibility for the program, the policy world is rightfully concerned with the costs and financial sustainability of the system. However, too strong a focus on spending neglects the core of the health system- the patient. This thesis explores patient satisfaction using the Medicare Current Beneficiary Survey (MCBS) 2019 datafiles, which could provide insight on the overall quality of care received. Several scholars have explored patient access, levels of satisfaction, and disparities in satisfaction. Some studies have even used the MCBS to assess patient satisfaction among different subpopulations. We instead explore the association of Medicare payor type on satisfaction. We examine nine aspects of satisfaction separately rather than combining the variables into one overall measure of satisfaction. This thesis uses ordered logistic regression to estimate the effects of Medicare payor type on patient satisfaction by controlling for sociodemographic characteristics and health status indicators and finds a limited relationship between Medicare Advantage enrollment and satisfactio
Language as a Hidden Constraint in Design
No full textWe are usually unaware that language imposes constraints on how we perceive, think and act, even as it is central to all that we do. What language enables is clearly apparent: all the cultures, technologies and designs we humans have created are grounded in our ability to coordinate with each other as we plan, evaluate, and make or build. What language constrains and hides is far more difficult to see, yet there are clues in our experiences. In this presentation, I delve into those clues to provide grounds for reflections and conversations concerning how the vocabulary used in design conversations, and even more so in design theories, biases what designers can do and how they can do it. What, for example, do the distinctions-such as feedback, perspective, need, user, and even the word design-enable and constrain? What possibilities are made invisible by how we understand and use these words? This has consequences for ethical living and the appreciation and creation of beauty, as these depend on harmonising among both the obvious and the implicit, the visible and the hidden dimensions of our lives on this planet
A Phonological Analysis of Nanticoke with Practical Applications for Language Revitalization
No full textPh.D.The present study is a phonological analysis of Nanticoke, the Eastern dialect continuum of Maryland Algonquian. Firstly, it provides a historical reconstruction of the phonology via an extensive analysis of the three 18th century word lists which comprise the known extant records of the Algonquian language formerly spoken on the Eastern Shore of Maryland. Secondly, it infers the reflexes in Nanticoke and its sister languages that are missing from the historical record based on the patterns observed throughout Eastern Algonquian. Thirdly, it reports on a representative sample of phylogenetic trees produced by Python scripts generated by ChatGPT and lays out their implications for Nanticoke’s descent from Proto-Eastern Algonquian. Finally, the study then uses the phonology findings to evaluate reconstruction work in existing pedagogical materials created by the author and others since 2006, using the Minimal Course Method (Bruchac, Quinn, & Tarant, 2021) as a framework. Specifically, through selective borrowing and reshaping of Southern New England Algonquian and Delawarean morphology, it demonstrates it is possible to create a new morphology for Nanticoke that captures the essence of Nanticoke as represented in the historical word lists. The dissertation seeks to update the understanding of Nanticoke in the context of more than forty years of research on Eastern Algonquian and to serve as the linguistic foundation that supports the ongoing revitalization of the Nanticoke language by the Nanticoke Indian Association in Millsboro, Delaware
Jose on Jones, The Right to Be Forgotten
No full textReview: Jones, M. L., (2016). Ctrl + Z: The Right to Be Forgotten. NYU Press. 256 pages. $18.00. ISBN: 9781479881703
Polling in the Age of Misinformation: The Role of Social Media Bots in Chile's 2022 National Plebiscite
No full textOn September 4, 2022, Chile held a National Plebiscite to determine if the public agreed
with the newly drafted text for a Political Constitution that would replace the current one.
In the months before the plebiscite, a crucial information campaign unfolded on social
media to persuade people to vote whether in favor or against it. As a result, floods of
misinformation about the newly drafted text of the constitution went viral on Chile’s social
media platforms. This paper seeks to understand social media bots’ role in disseminating
political misinformation during the 2022 National Plebiscite in Chile to understand better
how these automated entities have quickly become a prominent element of online political
culture and are implicated in electoral processes. To understand the involvement of social
media bots during the 2022 Plebiscite in Chile, this paper first surveys past literature
investigating how social media bots work and their role in spreading misinformation. Second,
it discusses the role of social media bots and automated propaganda in electoral campaigns.
To conclude, it draws connections to the phenomenon of bots and disinformation during
the 2022 Chile National Plebiscite through a preliminary data analysis performed on a
sample of 2,566 tweets by 1,627 accounts containing the hashtags #PlebiscitoChile2022,
#Apruebo (Approve), and #Rechazo (Reject) that were scraped from Twitter for the
campaign period of June to September 2022, as well as other relevant keywords to Chile’s
Plebiscite social media discussion
Circuit Lower Bounds Via Substitutions
No full textM.S.In this thesis, we introduce a new complexity measure for proving circuit lowerbounds.
The classical line of work [Hås87, Raz87, Smo87] proves exponential lower bounds
on the size of AC^0 and AC^0[p^k] (where p is a prime) circuits computing MAJ [Hås87,
Raz87, Smo87]. Barrington conjectured that MAJ is hard even for a larger class of
circuits: MAJ ∈ ACC^0 [Bar86].
We introduce a new measure of a Boolean function f , the substitution complexity
s(f ), which stems from VC dimension as a possible technique to prove circuit lower
bounds. We are able to show s(MAJ) ≥ n/2 . Using substitution complexity as a measure to prove circuit lower bounds, we are able to recover exponential lower bounds
for AC^0[p] circuits computing MAJ which follow via probablistic polynomials and certificate polynomials [KS12] . We also give a combinatorial method which circumvents
certificate polynomials to show MAJ cannot be computed by depth 2 AC^0 circuits.
Additionally we provide a combinatorial method to show that MAJ cannot be computed by depth 2 mod_p circuits
The Politics of Masculinity: Democratic Backsliding and Gender Empowerment
No full textM.P.P.Recent trends in democratic nations have indicated some level of ‘backsliding’ with news reels highlighting hypermasculine world leaders. At the same time, there have been increased feminist movements advocating for women’s rights; sometimes, it is for the same rights they had previously thought to be protected. The contrasting aims of these inclusive feminist groups and exclusive masculine politics create a political arena that has not been investigated in depth thus far. This paper explores the relationship between democratic backsliding and gender disempowerment, with a focus on the channels used for gender disempowerment in democratic backsliding. Using the University of Gothenburg’s Quality of Government (QoG) Dataset, democratic backsliding is shown to be a statistically significant predictor for gender inequality. The findings suggest that gender disempowerment is both a marker for and a mechanism of democratic backsliding. The paper identifies the major issue that while there is a correlation between gender empowerment and democracy, there is a need to interrogate the ways in which gender is employed by policymakers and politicians
TLISI 2023: The "Small Things" That Profoundly Impact Student Learning and Well-being, From Students Themselves
No full textThere are many aspects of teaching and supporting students that are sometimes difficult to measure and often are not voiced. It’s students who can tell us best what creates community in the classroom and allows them to connect their learning to their lived experiences. In this panel discussion, founding student members of the Engelhard Student Advisory Council reflect on the 2022-2023 academic year and share the learning tools, assignment designs, mentorship practices, and other interactions that have (and have not) been most effective in cultivating positive educational experiences. We invite attendees to ask questions and gain practical insights from students; students are often the highlights of TLlSI and faculty benefit greatly from hearing their perspectives