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Oregon Citizens Alliance's Impact on Gay Rights
No full textOregon is a great case study in looking at how the Christian right has been able to mass mobilize enough people to actually effect gay rights legislation. Oregon is probably when of the last states that anyone would ever believe that anti-gay rights legislation could actually pass and become law. Or at least it is difficult to believe that there would be a small percentage between the votes for and against an anti-gay initiative. Yet, anti-gay rights legislation did pass, at least in many local areas and there was a small percentage between votes for and against an anti-gay initiative not only once but twice. Although the religious right group, the Oregon Citizens Alliance (OCA), had a tremendous impact on gay rights legislation in Oregon in the early 1990s, the OCA will never attain the success that it once had in fighting gay rights legislation. It is the intent of this paper to explain how as well as why the Oregon Citizens Alliance rose to power in the early 1990s and what led to the OCA's sharp decline in the mid-1990s.Oregon Citizens Alliance's Impact on Gay Rights
by
Holly Iverson
P099: Senior Thesis
Dr. Paul Djupe
May 26, 1998
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Table of Contents
Introduction......................................................................... 1
Chapter One........................................................................ 4
Chapter Two....................................................................... 11
Chapter Three..................................................................... 14
Chapter Four....................................................................... 18
Chapter Five........................................................................ 22
Chapter Six.......................................................................... 25
Chapter Seven..................................................................... 29
Conclusion........................................................................... 33
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. Introduction
Oregon was and to some extent still today considered one of the most
culturally liberal states in the U.S. According to the Almanac of American Politics,
Oregon was characterized by its ability to take "liberal positions on cultural
issues."1 Yet after 1992, after Ballot Measure 9, the Almanac of American
Politics changed its view and described Oregon as " ... a quintessentially American
state thousands of miles from where most Americans live, an experimental
commonwealth and laboratory of reform, home of angry owl-hating loggers and
crusaders against homosexuality: all these things are Oregon."2 What happened
between the years of 1987 and 1992 to make the Almanac of American Politics
change their view of Oregon so drastically? The answer to the question is gay
rights3 and the religious right taking center stage in American politics. How is it
that a religious movement has gained as the amount of influence it has on
government policies at federal, state, and local levels when the United States
Constitution clearly states that there is a wall of separation between church and
state?
Since the late 1980s and early 1990s the religious right4
, especially Pat
Robertson's Christian Coalition, has gained an enormous amount of political clout
1 Barone, Michael and Grant Ujifusa. 1987. The Almanac of American Politics,
1988. Washington. D.C.: National Journal, 1024.
2Barone, Michael and Grant Ujifusa. 1993. The Almanac of American Politics,
1994. Washington. D.C. : National Journal, 1052.
3When this paper uses the term "gay rights," it encompasses all that is listed
below. Gay rights is a broad based term that encompasses rights such as not
being discriminated against in housing and employment based on sexual
orientation, partners allowed benefits, allowing same-sex couples to marry and
having the marriage recognized by all fifty U.S. states, considering crimes against
homosexuals as hate crimes.
4The term religious right and Christian right will be used interchangeably within
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within the Republican Party at national, state, and local levels. There is not one
state that does not have at least a local Christian Coalition chapter or a group
thatis affiliated with the national Christian Coalition. Not only has the Christian
Coalition embedded itself within the Republican Party in some areas of the
country, the Christian right, as a movement, has become the number one
advocate against abortion and gay rights. 1 994 was a banner year for the
Republican Party. For the first time in many years, the Republicans held not only
control of the U.S. Congress but held many state legislatures as well. Some of
state legislatures were controlled by Republicans who were either affiliated with
or a member of Christian right groups.
The fact that the Republicans controlled the federal and many states
legislatures has obviously not been positive for the gay rights movement. The
fact is that Republican controlled legislatures have had a negative impact on gay
rights legislation across the country. The Christian right has focused much of its
energy in stopping the U.S. Congress, state legislatures and local cities from
passing legislation that would make it illegal for someone to discriminate
someone else on the basis of sexual discrimination in housing and in employment
situations. The religious right would also like to see a law passed making it illegal
for same-sex couples to marry or to adopt children as well as making it illegal for
same-sex couples to receive any type of partner benefits.
this paper. The author understands that not all groups on the right of the political
spectrum are necessarily religious in nature. The author also understands that all
religious groups on the right side of the political spectrum are not necessarily
Christian. For the purpose of this paper, the terms "religious right" and "Christian
right" refer to groups who may use some type of scripture or higher authority to
condemn homosexuality as a moral wrong. Most groups which claim
homosexuality as a moral wrong are usually conservative, Christian groups who
are on the right side of the political spectrum.
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When one thinks of Oregon politics, usually one would assume that the
people of Oregon are very liberal in voting. This may be true when describing the
Portland and Willamette Valley, however, this is not true when describing the rest
of Oregon. It is the rest of Oregon that has proven this assumption false. For the
past six years there have been at least two different anti-gay initiatives brought
before the citizens of Oregon. Like all other Christian Coalition groups, the
Oregon Citizens Alliance has made both abortion and gay rights its two leading
issues. Although, the OCA has spent a more energy and resources in fighting
gay rights legislation than it has fighting abortion legislation. It was gay rights
which springboarded the OCA into both the state and national spotlight.
Oregon is a great case study in looking at how the Christian right has been
able to mass mobilize enough people to actually effect gay rights legislation.
Oregon is probably when of the last states that anyone would ever believe that
anti-gay rights legislation could actually pass and become law. Or at least it is
difficult to believe that there would be a small percentage between the votes for
and against an anti-gay initiative. Yet, anti-gay rights legislation did pass, at least
in many local areas and there was a small percentage between votes for and
against an anti-gay initiative not only once but twice. Although the religious right
group, the Oregon Citizens Alliance (OCA), had a tremendous impact on gay
rights legislation in Oregon in the early 1990s, the OCA will never attain the
success that it once had in fighting gay rights legislation. It is the intent of this
paper to explain how as well as why the Oregon Citizens Alliance rose to power
in the early 1990s and what led to the OCA's sharp decline in the mid-1990s.
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Chapter One
History
Pre-1988 Gay Rights History in Oregon
The first piece of gay rights legislation in the history of Oregon was
introduced in 1973 as House Bill 2930, which was narrowly defeated by one vote.
Had the bill been passed by the House, it would have prohibited discrimination on
the basis of sexual orientation in employment and housing. There has been gay
and lesbian civil rights legislation at least introduced in every legislative session
since 1973. The first law concerning gay and lesbian civil rights was passed in
1977 when the Eugene City Council passed an amendment to prohibit
discrimination in housing, employment and public accommodations on the basis
of sexual orientation. The amendment was later overturned when anti-gay forces
gathered enough signatures to put an amendment on the ballot. 5
In 1988, ten years after achieving that small victory in Eugene, the gay
rights movement faced for the first time the opponent who would not only be
successful in overturning gay and lesbian rights legislation and local ordinances
but also sponsor anti-gay initiatives and city ordinances for the next ten years. In
the beginning, the gay rights movement underestimated the appeal of this new
opponent and never did they imagine that this new opponent would, in the future,
also try to amend the state constitution to guarantee that there could be no gay
civil rights legislation nor ordinances passed declared by the Oregon State
Supreme Court as constitutional. No one could have predicted the success that
5Right to Pride. "Civil Rights for Gay Oregonians.", February 24, 1998.
http://www.rtp-or.org/civil.html.
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this opponent has had in the state of Oregon. That opponent was a Christian
right organization that was closely modeled after the national Christian Coalition.
It is an opponent that the gay rights movement has had to have fight every time
there has been any type of state legislation or local ordinances dealing with gay
rights on the ballots. It is an opponent that the gay rights movement is continuing
to fight yet today. That Christian right organization is better known as the Oregon
Citizens Alliance.
History of the Oregon Citizens Alliance (OCA)
The Oregon Citizens Alliance (OCA) is a right wing organization that
throughout its ten year history has had formal ties on and off with the Oregon
Christian Coalition and the national Christian Coalition. The OCA is best known
for its work on trying to pass and influence anti-gay legislation as well as
anti-abortion legislation in the Northwest part of the United States. In the earlier
part of the decade, the OCA became a national model for other Citizens Alliances
trying to pass the same type of anti-gay rights legislation and city ordinances.
The Oregon Citizens Alliance gained a great deal of political clout especially in
the states of Washington, Utah and Idaho.
The OCA was started following the 1 986 State Senate race. During the
1 980s, Republican Senator Bob Packwood was different from his Republican
peers due to his moderate to liberal positions on issues concerning women and
pro-choice abortion. In 1 98 1 and 1 982 Packwood led the Senate opposition to
recriminalize abortion and so anti-abortion supporters decided to punish
Packwood by defeating him in the Senatorial elections of 1 986. Their candidate
was Joe Lutz.6
6Lunch, William M. "Oregon: Identity and Politics in the Northwest." God at the
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Joe Lutz, a Baptist minister from Portland, was recruited to run against the
Republican Senator Packwood. Lutz, who was only expected to receive around
1 5 percent of the vote, received an unexpected 42 percent of the vote (more than
1 26,000 votes) at the Republican primary. One explanation for the high
percentage of votes casted for Lutz could be attributed to the fact that the turnout
of Republican voters in the primary was low that year. There were fewer than
300,000 votes casted out of 600,000 registered Republican voters.7 It was after
that surprising primary that Lutz and his anti-abortion supporters decided to
create a new organization, the Oregon Conservative Alliance. It was the hope of
the newly formed organization that Lutz would some day be elected to a top state
governmental position such as mayor of Portland or even Governor of Oregon.
Shortly after the organization was formed, Lutz greatly disappointed the Oregon
Conservative Alliance when he left his wife and went to California with another
women.8
The Oregon Conservative Alliance was left without a leader and eventually
turned to Lon Mabon. Mabon had served as one of the top campaign officials in
the 1 986 campaign to defeat Senator Packwood. With Mabon serving as
Chairman, the organization changed its name tp become the Oregon Citizens
Alliance and became affiliated with the national Christian Coalition in the Fall of
1 99 1 . Unlike other state affiliates, the OCA came to the national and state
Christian Coalition with a strong identity and an existing membership.9 The
Grass Roots: The Christian Right in the 1994 Elections. Eds. Mark J. Rozell
and Clyde Wilcox. Lanham: Rowman and Littlefield Publishers, Inc., 1 995, 231 .
7"Oregon: Identity and Politics in the Northwest," 231.
8Lunch, William M. "Oregon: The Flood Tide Recedes." God at the Grassroots:
The Christian Right in the 1996 Elections. Eds. Mark J. Rozell and Clyde
Wilcox. Lanham: Rowman and Littlefield Publishers, Inc., 1 995, 1 54.
9Coalition for Human Dignity. "OCA, Oregon Christian Coalition Split."
http://www.halycon.com/burghart/anti-gay.html.
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existing membership is attributed to Mabon's connections to Christian
fundamentalist churches throughout the state. 10 Mabon was able to effectively
recruit "evangelical ministers to alert the potential constituency to issues and,
once alerted, to mobilize the troops. "11
The Oregon Christian Coalition started in 1 9 9 1 . Mabon was the leading
spiritual leader of the state of Oregon at that time and was named leader of the
Oregon Christian Coalition while still remaining leader of the Oregon Citizens
Alliance. In July of 1 993, the OCA and the Oregon Christian Coalition ended all
formal ties. At that time there were several OCA members who were also
members on the Oregon Christian Coalition's b9ard. Lon Mabon, who held the
position as board chair of the Oregon Christian Coalition, resigned in order to
focus more of his energy on the OCA. Three other OCA board members, Loretta
Neet, Phillip Ramsdale and Scott Lively, left the Christian Coalition leaving only
one person, Al Mobley, to sit on the boards of both organizations.12 Mobley
would later criticize the OCA as being too extreme in their views of homosexuals
and gay rights.
It is said that there was some friction between the two organizations. The
biggest problem between the two organizations was the fact that Lon Mabon and
Ralph Reed did not like one another. At that time Christian Coalition executive
director, Ralph Reed, Jr., criticized the wording of anti-gay Ballot Measure 9 and
said he felt that it was too harsh. There was also some friction between Mabon
and Reed regarding the tactics used in the race for chair of the Oregon
Republican Party. Others have argued that it was the OCA's negative reputation
in the Northwest that was the real cause for the split between the two
10"0regon: The Flood Tide Recedes," 154.
11 "0regon: Identity and Politics in the Northwest," 233.
12Coalition for Human Dignity, "OCA, Oregon Christian Coalition Split."
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organizations. The split may have been a way for the national and the Oregon
Christian Coalition to be able to distance itself from the extreme beliefs of the
OCA.13
Ballot Measure 8 (1988)
In 1988, the OCA brought to the Oregon voters the first ever initiative
regarding gay rights legislation, Ballot Measure 8. Democratic Governor Neil
Goldschmidt in 1987 signed an executive order that prohibited discrimination on
the basis of sexual orientation in state employment practices. The reason for the
executive order, according to Goldschmidt, was "to ensure a fair, level playing
field for all employees. It was intended to give special rights to no one."14
A year later the OCA was able to qualify initiative, Ballot Measure 8, which
overturned the executive order. Although the initiative was passed by 56 percent
of Oregon voters, the Oregon Supreme Court later overturned the ballot measure
declaring it unconstitutional and the executive order was reinstated.15 The three
judge panel found that the initiative violated the state constitutional guarantees of
free speech. Although the ballot measure was overturned, the OCA successful in
that it was able to prove that they could attract other voters outside of their 1 O to
15 percent core constituency with their anti-gay rights campaign.16
1989-1998
During the period from 1989 to 1991, there was only one piece of
legislation and only one city ordinance that was passed regarding gay rights. In
13Coalition for Human Dignity, "OCA, Oregon Christian Coalition Split."
14Rubenstein, Sura. "Court Kills Anti-Gay Rights Measure."
http://www.qrd.org/qrd/usa/oregon/1992/oca 1988.loses-11.13.92.
15Right to Pride. "Civil Rights for Gay Oregonians."
16"Oregon: The Flood Tide Recedes," 154.
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1989, the Oregon Senate passed Senate Bill 606 otherwise known as the "hate
crimes bill." It required all Oregon law enforcement agencies to report statistics
on bias crimes, which included sexual orientation. This law at least
acknowledged the fact that sexual orientation could be used as a way to set
people apart from one another. In 1 9 9 1 , the Portland City Council passed an
ordinance that prohibited discrimination in employment and housing for gay and
lesbian Portlanders. Today, the cities and counties of Eugene, Corvallis, Ashland
and Multnomah County are the only ones to offer any type of legal protection to
their gay and lesbian citizens.17
In 1 996, the citizens of Oregon saw Christine Tanner along with other gay
state employees sue the State of Oregon for domestic partner benefits in Tanner
v. Oregon Health Sciences University (OHSU). Judge Steven Gallager ruled on
behalf of Tanner and the other state employees. The court ruled that the
provisions violated that state constitution and state laws prohibiting discrimination
on the basis of gender and sexual orientation. The court ordered state
government agencies to extend medical coverage to the partners of lesbian and
gay state employees. The decision is currently being appealed by Oregon's
Attorney General in the Oregon State Supreme Court. Due to the fact that the
Oregon Attorney General is appealing the decision, the lower court's ruling has
not yet taken effect.18
In 1 997, the Oregon House and Senate voted upon two pieces of
legislation that dealt with gay and lesbian civil rights. The House voted on HB
371 9-ENDA (Employment Non Discrimination Act), which passed the floor by a
40 to 20 vote. It was Representative Chuck Carpenter who brought HB 2734 (an
17Right to Pride. " Civil Rights for Gay Oregonians."
18"Lambda Legal States: Oregon." Lambda Legal Defense and Education Fund,
1 997-1 998. http://www.lambdalegal.org/cgi-bin/pages/states/record?record37.
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outline of ENDA) to the House floor from the Judiciary Committee where
Chairman John Minnis was unwilling to let the bill be heard. The House was at a
standstill for two days after Rep. Carpenter brought the bill to the floor. The
House leadership finally agreed that ENDA was to be re-introduced as a new bill
from the friendlier Commerce Committee as HB 3719. The new ENDA bill was
easily passed out of the Commerce Committee by a seven to one vote. Although
ENDA was passed in the House, the Senate refused action on the bill, which
finally died, short one vote. 19
The other piece of legislation introduced in 1997 was by Republican
Senator Marilyn Shannon. This piece of legislation was SB 577-DOMA (Defense
of Marriage Act). DOMA would define marriage as "between a man and a
woman." The bill was passed by the Senate on May 22, 1997, by a twenty to
seven vote. DOMA received several hearings in the House, but died in
committee. The amendments were passed in the House Judiciary Family Law
Subcommittee, which referred the bill onto the full Judiciary Committee and then
onto the House Rules Committee, where it failed to advance.20
19"Civil Rights for Gay Oregonians." Right to Pride.
20·civil Rights for Gay Oregonians." Right to Pride.
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Chapter Two
Ballot Measure Number Nine (1992)
In 1992, the Oregon Citizens Alliance gained national attention with Ballot
Measure 9. The measure would have amended the Oregon state constitution to
read that the state could not create nor enact laws that protected the rights of
homosexuals. Below is a copy of Ballot Measure 9 as it appeared to the Oregon
voters in November of 1992 on the general ballot.
PROPOSED CONSTITUTIONAL AMENDMENT
Be It Enacted by the People of the State of Oregon:
Paragraph 1. The constitution of the State of Oregon:
by creating a new section to be added to and made a part of
Article 1 and to read:
Section 41 ( 1) This state shall not recognize any
categorical provision such as "sexual orientation," "sexual
preference," and similar phrases that includes homosexuality,
pedophilia, sadism or masochism. Quotas minority status,
affirmative action, or any similar concepts, shall not apply to
these forms of conduct, nor shall government promote these
behaviors.
(2) State, regional and local governments and their
properties and monies shall not be used to promote,
encourage, or facilitate homosexuality, pedoph
Cardiac Ultrasound Video Generation Using a Diffusion Model with Temporal Transformer
No full textCardiac ultrasound is widely used for the diagnosis and monitoring of cardiovascular diseases due to its noninvasive nature, real-time imaging capability, and low cost. However, its clinical utility is often limited by noise sensitivity and acquisition variability, which adversely affect automated interpretation and sequence consistency. To overcome these limitations, this paper presents a multimodal deep learning framework that combines a denoising diffusion model with a Temporal Transformer to generate high-quality cardiac ultrasound videos. A unified preprocessing pipeline with intensity normalisation and standardisation is employed to reduce intersample variation and enhance anatomical structures. Spatial features are first extracted from individual frames, followed by temporal modelling across sequences using the Temporal Transformer. These features guide the latent-space denoising process, optionally augmented by ControlNet for structure-aware generation. The experimental results demonstrate that the proposed method achieves robust performance, with an FID of 43.50, an FVD of 274.52, and an inception score of 8.62. Ablation studies further verify the critical contributions of ControlNet and composite loss design, highlighting the effectiveness of the framework in ensuring both spatial fidelity and temporal coherence
‘Mammothfluidics’:Amino acid dating of fossil mammal tooth enamel using a modular microfluidic system
No full textDating fossil samples helps reconstruct evolutionary history, aiding conservation efforts and mitigating climate change impacts. Amino acid geochronology of tooth enamel using the intra-crystalline protein decomposition (IcPD) approach allows direct dating of mammal teeth over Quaternary timescales (∼2.5 million years), beyond the limits of radiocarbon dating (∼50,000 years). However current methods require specialist equipment and relatively lengthy processing times. We developed a modular microfluidic system for chiral amino acid analysis of tooth enamel samples, consisting of three sequential glass microfluidic devices for sample bleaching, release of hydrolysable amino acids, and biphasic separation. Relative concentrations and D/L values of key amino acids were measured using reverse-phase high performance liquid chromatography (RP-HPLC). The microfluidic method reduced sample amounts from ∼15 mg to ∼1 mg and bleaching time from 72 h to 2 h. Amino acid compositions of modern and fossil samples were similar between the microfluidic approach and standard IcPD method, with good agreement up to D/L values ∼0.5 for phenylalanine (Phe) and glutamic acid (Glx). The method worked successfully across various genera and operators, with reduced sample mass and analysis time. This approach results in less destructive sampling of precious fossil samples and enables preparation steps in non-specialist labs, potentially allowing IcPD dating within the fossils’ country
Household food insecurity and its impact on child and adolescent health outcomes in Western high-income countries: a rapid review of mechanisms and associations
No full textObjective
The primary aim of this rapid review was to provide a summary of the mechanisms by which HFI is associated with child and adolescent health outcomes. The secondary aim was to identify key HFI determinants, provide an updated account of HFI-associated child/ adolescent health outcomes and build a conceptual map to illustrate and consolidate the findings.
Design
A rapid review was performed using EMBASE, Medline, Web of Science and The Cochrane library. Inclusion criteria were observational High- income English-language studies, studies evaluating the mechanisms and associations between HFI and child health outcomes using statistical methods.
Setting
High income English-speaking countries.
Participants
Child (3-10 years) and adolescent populations (11-24 years) and their parents, if appropriate.
Results
Eight studies reported on the mechanisms by which HFI is related to child health outcomes, suggesting that maternal mental health and parenting stress play mediating roles between HFI and child/adolescent mental health, behaviour and child weight status. Sixty studies reported on associations between HFI and various child health outcomes. HFI had significant impact on diet and mental health, which appeared to be interrelated. Sociodemographic factors were identified as determinants of HFI and moderated the relationship between HFI and child/adolescent health outcomes.
Conclusions
There is a gap in the evidence explaining the mechanistic role of diet quality between HFI and child weight status, as well as the interplay between diet, eating behaviours and mental health on physical child health outcomes. The conceptual map highlights opportunities for intervention and policy evaluations using complex systems approaches
Decoding acceptance of driver monitoring systems: Evaluating alternative measurement models, cross-country variations, and behavioural intention
No full textDriver monitoring systems (DMS) demonstrate significant potential for enhancing road safety. It is imperative to comprehend potential users’ attitudes towards DMS to optimise their benefits and increase public acceptance. This study investigates potential users’ acceptance of DMS in conditionally automated driving systems (SAE level 3) by evaluating alternative measurement models and assessing cross-country variations across nine countries (i.e., Germany, Spain, France, Japan, Poland, Sweden, the United Kingdom, the United States, and China). Utilising survey data from 9025 drivers, we compared the principal component analysis and the four models (a single-factor model, a six factors model, a two higher-order factors model, and a two lower-order factors model) via structural equation modelling. A model with two correlated factors, General Acceptance and Concerns, emerged as the optimal solution with high reliability across constructs. Significant cross-country differences in all constructs were found, although only 0.3% of the variance in behavioural intention was attributable to country-level differences. A linear mixed model demonstrated that the general acceptance factor positively related to behavioural intention, whereas concerns had a small but significant negative effect. The implications for research and practice suggest that while individual-level perceptions are paramount, country context also plays a role, albeit a modest one, in shaping users’ willingness to adopt DMS technologies
Experiences of young people, parents and delivery staff of the social prescribing intervention ‘Safety Nets’: A qualitative investigation
No full textHigh numbers of young people in the United Kingdom (UK) experience mental health difficulties. Referrals to Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services (CAMHS) have increased and young people often face lengthy waits before accessing treatment, during which time young people's mental health can deteriorate further. Safety Nets was developed to support young people on CAMHS waiting lists. It is a social prescribing intervention that runs for 2 h a week for 8 weeks at local professional sports clubs. Sessions include 1 h of psychoeducation and 1 h of physical activity co-delivered by a CAMHS clinician and sports club coach. The aim of this qualitative work was to explore the experiences of young people who attended and staff who delivered Safety Nets, to inform future delivery and research. Qualitative semi-structured interviews were conducted with 25 participants, including young people who attended Safety Nets (n = 6), their parents/carers (n = 6) and delivery staff (n = 14). Interviews explored the acceptability and suitability of the intervention and recommendations for future delivery. A thematic analysis identified four themes and one sub-theme from the data: (1) Motivations to attend or deliver Safety Nets, (2) Positive experiences of Safety Nets, (3) Perceived positive impact of Safety Nets (sub-theme ‘Staff development opportunity’) and (4) Application of skills learned. Overall, qualitative data indicated the Safety Nets programme was well received and highlighted important aspects of delivery for implementation. Future research, such as large-scale evaluation of the efficacy and cost-effectiveness of Safety Nets, is warranted
Measuring individual differences in the speed of attention using the distractor intrusion task
No full textHow quickly we attend to objects plays an important role in navigating the world, especially in dynamic and rapidly changing environments. Measuring individual differences in attention speed is therefore an important, yet challenging, task. Although reaction times in visual search tasks have often been used as an intuitive proxy of such individual differences, these measures are limited by inconsistent levels of reliability and contamination by non-attentional factors. This study introduces the rate of post-target distractor intrusions (DI) in the rapid serial visual presentation (RSVP) paradigm as an alternative method of studying individual differences in the speed of attention. In RSVP, a target is presented for a brief duration and embedded among multiple distractors. DIs are reports of a subsequent distractor rather than the target and have previously been shown to be associated with the speed of attention. The present study explored the reliability and validity of DI rates as a measure of individual differences. In three studies, DI rates showed high internal consistency and test–retest reliability over a year (>.90), even with a short task administration of only about 5 minutes. Moreover, DI rates were associated with measures related to attention speed, but not with unrelated measures of attentional control, reading speed, and attentional blink effects. Taken together, DI rates can serve as a useful tool for research into individual differences in the speed of attention. Links to a downloadable and easily executable DI experiment, as well as a brief discussion of methodological considerations, are provided to facilitate such future research
Commentary: Autoimmune/Autoinflammatory Syndrome Induced by Adjuvants (ASIA Syndrome) After Polypropylene Mesh Implantation – Protocol of a Pilot Study for Diagnostics and Treatment
No full textAn unmanned traffic command system for controlled waterway in inland river: an edge-centric IoT approach
No full textThe controlled waterway in the upper reaches of the Yangtze River has become a bottleneck for shipping due to its curved, narrow and turbulent characteristics. Consequently, the competent authorities must establish controlled one-way waterways and signal stations to ensure traffic safety. These signal stations are often located in remote and uninhabited mountainous areas, causing great difficulties in the living and working conditions for the staff. Therefore, the trend has emerged toward unmanned and remote traffic command at signal stations. The vessels passing through it must obey the signal revealed by the Intelligent Vessel Traffic Signaling System (IVTSS) to pass in one direction. The accuracy of signals is directly related to traffic safety and efficiency. However, the unreliability of vessel sensing sensors in these areas and the latency of transmission and computation of large amounts of sensing data may negatively impact IVTSS. Hence, more information from the physical world is needed to ensure the stable operation of IVTSS, and we proposed an edge-computing-centric sensing and execution system based on IoT architecture to enhance the reliability of IVTSS. We conducted experiments using plug-and-play methods, reducing the command and recording error rates by 89.47% and 86.27%, respectively, achieving the goal of real-time perception control
Outdoor lighting and active travel: A high-resolution analysis using satellite imagery and Strava data in Glasgow
No full textIntroduction:
The benefits of active travel are well-established. While previous research has explored how built environment factors (such as population density, accessibility, land use, and infrastructure) influence active travel, micro-scale features like outdoor lighting have received less attention. This study examines associations between outdoor lighting levels and active travel in Glasgow, accounting for broader contextual factors and distinguishing between daylight and dark conditions.
Methods:
We used Strava data, satellite-derived outdoor lighting imagery, and other spatial datasets aggregated to small-area zones in Glasgow. Bayesian spatial models (Besag–York–Mollié) were fitted to estimate associations between contextual variables and distances travelled on foot, by bike, and by both modes combined, separately for daylight and dark hours.
Results:
Outdoor lighting levels derived from night-time satellite imagery were positively associated with walking, cycling, and overall active-travel distances during both light conditions (daylight and dark). These associations were stronger during dark hours, particularly for cycling. Several contextual relationships also varied by light condition: industrial density was positively associated with cycling only during daylight, while quietness and gradient showed stronger associations during daylight. Population and income deprivation were negatively associated across all modes under both light conditions.
Conclusions:
Our findings underscore the potential relevance of lighting in shaping active travel patterns after dark, particularly for cycling. They also highlight the need for future research that considers light conditions and time of day in environmental studies of mobility, as well as across broader contexts, specific locations, and diverse population groups – to better inform equitable and effective active travel policy