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Climate change news risk and advertising spending
Get PDFWe examine the effect of climate change news risk on corporate advertising spending. Using a novel measure of media-driven climate risk matched to firm-level advertising data, we find a robust negative relationship between climate news risk and advertising spending. Mechanism tests show that financial constraints mediate this relationship. The effect is stronger for firms with low stock market liquidity and high cash-flow volatility. We also find that domestic firms reduce their advertising spending relative to their multinational counterparts, which aligns with the idea that international operations provide diversification and stronger cash flow benefits that enhance firms’ resilience to the effects of domestic climate risk shocks. The results remain consistent across different advertising measures, and after correcting for selection bias with a Heckman two-step method. We address endogeneity concerns through instrumental variable estimation. Our findings support the risk management hypothesis that firms proactively adjust their financial policies to mitigate the negative effects of rising climate risk exposure
Phylogenomic Barcoding of Soil Seed Bank–Persistent and Wind‐Dispersed Non‐Native Plant Species in South Georgia
Get PDFClimate change and invasive species are leading drivers of biodiversity loss, with island ecosystems being especially vulnerable. South Georgia, a remote sub‐Antarctic island, is 170 km long with approximately 30,000 ha of vegetated coastal areas, as snow and ice dominate the inland regions. Human activities on the island have historically introduced non‐native species, resulting in 41 introduced vascular plant species compared with only 24 native ones. To address this imbalance, the South Georgia Non‐Native Plant Management Strategy was implemented (2016–2020) to control non‐native plant populations. We assessed emergent seedlings from South Georgia soil samples and wind‐dispersed seeds to determine which species persist in the soil seed bank and contribute to dispersal. Using a molecular barcoding approach, we evaluated traditional markers (rbcL and matK) and optimized a high‐throughput Angiosperms353 sequencing pipeline for accurate seedling identification. We generated a reference library covering all native and non‐native species and applied this to 1,498 emergent seedlings and 737 trapped seeds. Molecular barcoding identified 21 species, including 10 non‐natives and 11 natives. Strikingly, 84% of emergent seedlings were non‐native, with Class III invasive species ( Cerastium fontanum , Poa annua , Taraxacum officinale ) dominating across most sites and in all wind traps. By contrast, Class I and II species occurred rarely and only at a few sites, indicating that management efforts have substantially reduced their spread, though viable seeds persist in the soil. These findings highlight both the continued threat from persistent seed banks of dominant invaders and the value of molecular barcoding for long‐term monitoring. Our approach provides a framework for biosecurity and restoration management in South Georgia and other vulnerable ecosystems under climate change pressures
Perceptions of help-seeking for sexual violence and harassment by minoritised United Kingdom Higher Education students: a qualitative study using vignettes
No full textSexual violence affecting university students is a significant problem worldwide. Though recent legislation introduced into UK universities aims to tackle the problem, it remains to be seen how effective this will be. Furthermore, within much existing research and legislation, the voices of minoritised students in relation to the issue are absent. This research utilised qualitative focus groups and interviews with 38 minoritised students from two universities in England. Most are female (n=23) and ages range from 18 years – 44 years. Using vignettes, interviews explored help-seeking behaviours in relation to sexual violence and considered intersections with minoritised identities. Thematic analysis suggests that sexual violence is normalised within universities and underpinned by ‘community knowledges’. Structural vulnerabilities and minoritisation impact perceptions of ‘who’ and ‘what’ counts in relation to sexual violence. Students also display a lack of knowledge about support provision at their universities, a finding which highlights universities’ difficulties with informing students about what support is available. Furthermore, we found that students rely heavily on their informal networks in relation to decision-making about help-seeking. Overall, structural vulnerabilities experienced by minoritised students hindered their willingness to report. Intersectional recommendations for university action and policy are offered
Engaging citizens from low-income communities in transport planning: experiences from peer research studies conducted in three African cities
Get PDFThis paper draws on experience from a series of transport-focused studies built round peer research with community members resident in low-income neighbourhoods at the periphery of three major cities: Abuja, Cape Town and Tunis. These were conducted firstly with young women aged 18–35 in all three cities over a four-year period (2019–2022, i.e. spanning the pandemic), followed by a recently completed pilot with young men in the same age group (but in this case restricted to Cape Town). The paper reflects firstly on the peer research methodology employed (including training procedures, ethical issues and context specific challenges/barriers) and the significant field outputs achieved by the groups concerned through their in-depth interviews, participant observation and mobility diaries. It then moves on to consider the engagement of the community peer researchers with city transport professionals and practitioners at our project stakeholder consultative group meetings and their potential for promoting the design of more inclusive, accessible and sustainable transport systems. While peer researchers' direct field evidence offers rare insights into the transport and mobility challenges that many marginalised residents of these low-income neighbourhoods experience in the everyday – perspectives that could be crucial to effective user engagement around transport issues in an Urban Living Lab - the actual patterns and potentialities of engagement within each city that might promote a more socially just travel environment are strongly shaped by a range of locally specific factors. These extend from resource and policy contexts set within distinctive local urban geographies, to the personalities and positionality of all actors involved
Tracing individuality and hand preference in Upper Palaeolithic engraving: experimental and traceological insights
No full textIn the context of Palaeolithic archaeology, identifying traits of individual creators of prehistoric art remains a formidable challenge. This study introduces innovative traceological methods employed to analyze engraved stone plaquettes from the 15,800-year-old Late Upper Paleolithic site of Gönnersdorf, Germany. Utilizing advanced techniques such as confocal microscopy, alongside manual and robotic experimentation, we investigate the hand preferences of individual engravers. Preliminary results reveal discernible patterns in tool positioning and tool angle variations, providing insights into engravers’ lateralities. By integrating experimental findings with archaeological data, this study enhances our understanding of prehistoric engraving practices and contributes to the growing research on lateralized cognitive and motor processes in prehistoric art creation
A coupled FEM–SBM methodology for dynamic interaction of multiple structures and soil
Get PDFIn densely populated urban areas, there is a growing trend in constructing complex structural systems that include underground structures located beneath clusters of aboveground buildings. The dynamic interaction between these underground and aboveground structures, mediated by the surrounding soil, is known as structure-soil–structure interaction (SSSI). SSSI is a topic whose effects pose significant challenges to the design and analysis of such complex systems. In this paper, we propose a novel numerical methodology for addressing longitudinally invariant multi-structure-soil interaction problems in elastodynamics. The proposed approach combines the Finite Element Method (FEM) for modelling structural components with the Singular Boundary Method (SBM) for simulating wave propagation in the soil and capturing inter-structural coupling effects, all formulated in the wavenumber-frequency domain. The synergy of FEM, well-suited to complex geometries, and the computational simplicity and efficiency of SBM yields a robust and accurate framework for solving SSSI problems. The framework features a strongly coupled formulation between structures and soil, enhancing both accuracy and ease of implementation. The accuracy of the method is assessed through several benchmark studies involving cylindrical shells and cylindrical solids, while its practical applicability is demonstrated via real-scale numerical examples, with relative errors typically below 2%. Furthermore, the computational efficiency of the proposed methodology is compared with traditional hybrid approaches, in which both the structures and the surrounding soil are modelled using FEM, with the remaining soil represented via the Method of Fundamental Solutions (MFS) or Boundary Element Method (BEM). On average, the proposed approach achieves a computational performance nearly twenty times faster than that of the reference solutions. The results underscore the advantages of the proposed framework in terms of modelling simplicity, numerical efficiency, accuracy and robustness, and show that the method is scalable and capable of evaluating interactions among an arbitrary number of structures
LISA Binaries
Get PDFWe use population synthesis modelling to predict the gravitational wave (GW) signal that the Laser Interferometer Space Antenna (LISA) will detect from the Galactic population of compact binary systems. We implement a realistic star formation history with time and position-dependent metallicity, and account for the effect of supernova kicks on present-day positions. We consider all binaries that have a white dwarf (WD), neutron star (NS), or black hole primary in the present-day. We predict that the summed GW signal from all Galactic binaries will already be detectable 3 months into the LISA mission, by measuring the power spectrum of the total GW strain. We provide a simple publicly available code to calculate such a power spectrum from a user-defined binary population. In the full 4 year baseline mission lifetime, we conservatively predict that >2000 binaries could be individually detectable as GW sources. We vary the assumed common envelope (CE) efficiency α, and find that it influences both the shape of the power spectrum and the relative number of detectable systems with WD and NS progenitors. In particular, the ratio of individually detectable binaries with chirp masses less than one solar mass to those greater than one solar mass increases with α. We therefore conclude that LISA may be able to diagnose the CE efficiency, which is currently poorly constrained
Music, Mortality, Memory
No full textMusic comes to our aid when confronted with a sense of our own mortality as here revealed in a variety of contexts and moods. Musical composition and performance significantly influence and draw from personal loss and group trauma, gaining force in kaleidoscopic patterns of shared grief; so, too, with spiritual, devotional, and ritual participation. The chapters of this book, rooted in cultural, historical, and social case studies, exemplify these musical dynamics. Alert to a variety of diverse academic disciplines, the introduction and conclusion provide additional analysis and not only indicate directions for future research, but also for contemporary study across the humanities and social sciences
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