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Weaving the energy transition web: Structural dynamics and drivers of the global lithium-cobalt-nickel trade network
No full textThe accelerating global energy transition has created unprecedented demand for critical minerals essential for batteries and clean energy technologies. While existing research has examined individual metal trade networks, the core scientific question of how these minerals jointly evolve as an integrated “energy transition web” remains unanswered. This study addresses this gap by constructing a multi-layer aggregated trade network for lithium-cobalt-nickel spanning 2010–2024. It uses complex network and quadratic assignment procedure (QAP) regression to identify mechanisms shaping network dynamics and their implications for supply-chain resilience. The results show that the network has transformed from sparse to a dense “small-world” structure, dominated by an intensifying Asian core. Traditional drivers such as economic scale have weakened, whereas environmental and strategic factors have emerged as primary drivers. These findings demonstrate that the global critical-mineral system is evolving into more interconnected yet more politically segmented energy-transition web, highlighting emerging vulnerabilities and informing future resource-security strategies
How women engage in muscle-strengthening exercises: a qualitative study from the WISH project
Get PDFBackground:
While the benefits of muscle-strengthening activities are well established, national surveillance data suggest that women do fewer muscle-strengthening activities than men. The study aimed to understand the barriers and facilitators to participation in muscle-strengthening exercise among women aged 18 to 64 who are currently meeting the muscle-strengthening guidelines, and to identify strategies to improve involvement in these activities.
Methods:
24 women, aged 18 to 64, from the United Kingdom who participated in muscle-strengthening exercises at least two days per week were invited to an online or in-person interview. A qualitative study using reflexive thematic analysis was used to identify key themes related to the barriers and facilitators of participation, as well as potential strategies to improve participation.
Results:
Qualitative findings revealed four overarching themes: (1) reason for participating in muscle-strengthening exercises (health concerns and sports performance), (2) barriers to muscle-strengthening exercise participation (perceived time constraint, low motivation, cultural stigma and societal perceptions, confidence in ability and accessibility), (3) facilitators to participating in muscle-strengthening exercises (resources or information, accountability, social support, ability to choose and positive changes) and (4) strategies to improve women’s participation in muscle-strengthening exercises (what an individual and others can do).
Conclusion:
This study enhances understanding of women’s engagement in muscle-strengthening exercises by highlighting how individual, social, and physical environments interact to influence participation. Findings suggest that strategies are needed that target all levels of influence to help increase participation in muscle-strengthening exercises
Quantifying query fairness under unawareness
Get PDFTraditional ranking algorithms are designed to retrieve the most relevant items for a user’s query, but they often inherit biases from data that can unfairly disadvantage vulnerable groups. Fairness in information access systems (IAS) is typically assessed by comparing the distribution of groups in a ranking to a target distribution, such as the overall group distribution in the dataset. These fairness metrics depend on knowing the true group labels for each item. However, when groups are defined by demographic or sensitive attributes, these labels are often unknown, leading to a setting known as “fairness under unawareness.” To address this, group membership can be inferred using machine-learned classifiers, and group prevalence is estimated by counting the predicted labels. Unfortunately, such an estimation is known to be unreliable under dataset shift, compromising the accuracy of fairness evaluations. In this paper, we introduce a robust fairness estimator based on quantification that effectively handles multiple sensitive attributes beyond binary classifications. Our method outperforms existing baselines across various sensitive attributes and, to the best of our knowledge, is the first to establish a reliable protocol for measuring fairness under unawareness across multiple queries and groups
Letter to the Editor, “Global oral health: defining the research agenda in the public interest”
No full textNo abstract available
Developing and evaluating the Comprehensive Hierarchical Eustress Review (CHER)
Get PDFPsychometric research on eustress—the positive experience of a challenging situation—faces a variety of issues that include: What features of eustress are central to experiencing challenging situations positively? What psychometric structure best fits these features (unidimensional, multidimensional, bifactor)? How is eustress related to distress and wellbeing? Can individuals be clustered effectively into different eustress profiles? To address these issues, we developed a novel eustress instrument: the Comprehensive Hierarchical Eustress Review (CHER), motivated by a new model, the Comprehensive Hierarchical construct of Eustress (CHE). Analogous to the CHE model, the CHER instrument contains 3 subscales for CHE’s 3 sources of eustress (goal-directed action, momentary experience, stable qualities) with 47 items that reflect the 47 features of eustress that CHE extracted from the literature. To evaluate CHER and explore its potential for understanding eustress, we assessed it in a well-powered adult UK sample (N = 260). Using confirmatory factor analyses, we found that eustress is best understood as both a unidimensional and a multidimensional construct (i.e., a bifactor model), with items from all three subscales contributing to its conceptual core. The best performing model exhibited desirable internal qualities (satisfactory reliability and item discrimination) and external qualities (eustress negatively related to distress and positively related to wellbeing). Using latent profile analysis, we identified four clusters of individuals with different eustress profiles, who differed further on sociodemographic characteristics and personality traits. Findings reported have theoretical, empirical, and interventional implications for future work on the generation of positive experiences in challenging situations
Beyond the cuff: state-of-the-art on contactless blood pressure monitoring
No full textBlood pressure (BP) monitoring is crucial for identifying high BP (hypertension) and is an important aspect of patient care. However, traditional cuff-based methods for BP monitoring are unsuitable for continuous monitoring and can cause discomfort to patients. This survey critically examines the emerging field of cuffless BP monitoring, highlighting advances beyond traditional cuff-based methods. Technologies such as radar, optical, acoustic, and capacitive sensors offer the potential for continuous, non-invasive BP estimation, enabling applications in remote health monitoring and ambient clinical intelligence. We introduce a unifying taxonomy covering sensing modalities, physiological measurement principles, signal processing techniques, and translational challenges. Emphasis is placed on methods that eliminate subject-specific calibration, overcome motion artifacts, and satisfy international validation standards. The review also analyses Machine Learning (ML) and sensor fusion approaches that enhance predictive accuracy. Despite encouraging results, challenges remain in achieving clinically acceptable accuracy across diverse populations and real-world conditions. This work delineates the current landscape, benchmarks performance against gold standards, and identifies key future directions for scalable, explainable, and regulatory-compliant BP monitoring systems
Personalising persuasive technologies for behaviour change: a scoping review and research agenda
No full textPersuasive technologies help users meet various types of behavioural goals, and are becoming increasingly personalised to individual users’ needs. Research has been siloed into single domains of behaviour change, such as health or environmental behaviours, leaving open questions on how users across domains respond to personalised interventions. To fill this gap, we reviewed 56 publications between 2013 and 2024, which developed personalised persuasive technologies. We analysed how the technologies were designed and how users evaluated them. We found that persuasive technologies build user profiles that are either static or dynamic, and use this information to deliver three types of personalised interventions: personalised goals, personalised messages, or personalised timing of reminders. Personalised technologies were more effective than one-size-fits-all and utilised a combination of behaviour change techniques. Users not only evaluated personalisation positively, but wanted to know how it was achieved. In addition, users preferred goals that were easy to meet, and appreciated empathetic support from persuasive technology when a goal was not met. Based on these findings, we discuss methodological, theoretical, and practical implications, as well as future research directions for personalised persuasive technologies
Characteristics of parks associated with depression in women only: a cross-sectional study of 329363 adults
No full textBackground:
To examine associations between public park characteristics within different walking distances from residential locations and depression, to distinguish between features within parks (e.g. amenities, attractions, facilities, tree cover) and park metrics in the home area (e.g. number of parks, size, and total area), and to employ rigorous geospatial analysis linking the best available objectively measured park and urban green space (UGS) exposures to validated depression outcomes across multiple scales.
Methods:
This population-based cross-sectional study utilised baseline data from 329,363 UK Biobank participants resident in urban areas. Prevalent diagnosed depression was defined as an ICD-10 code of F32 (depressive episode) or F33 (recurrent depressive disorder). Park characteristics and urban green space data were derived from Ordnance Survey Great Britain datasets and spatially linked to participants’ residential addresses. Three definitions of Home Catchment Area size were tested for every individual respondent: 400 m (m), 800 m, and 1600 m, as proxies for a 10-,20- and 40-min return walk respectively. Logistic regression models assessed associations with robust statistical approaches including assessment of interaction, correction for multiple testing, confounder adjustment, and sensitivity analyses.
Results:
Specific park characteristics within 20-min and 40-min catchments were associated with reduced depression likelihood among women only. Within 40-min catchments, protective associations were observed for recreational amenities (cafés: odds ratio (OR) 0.89, 95% confidence interval (CI) 0.85–0.93; toilets: OR 0.85, 95% CI 0.79–0.91), attractions (OR 0.83, 95% CI 0.80–0.87), sports facilities (OR 0.84, 95% CI 0.79–0.90), and tree canopy coverage (e.g. > 20%, OR 0.88, 95% CI 0.85–0.91). In a 20-min catchment, each 1% increase in urban greenspace classified as parks was associated with 11% reduced depression odds among women (OR 0.89, 95% CI 0.82–0.95). No significant protective associations were observed among men, with some paradoxical adverse associations identified.
Conclusions:
This study provides robust evidence for protective associations between park characteristics and depression among women, but not men. Findings support proximity-based planning concepts but challenge the current policy and practice focus on 20-min neighbourhood and identify park features which optimise preventive potential. Results have direct implications for evidence-based urban planning policy internationally, providing a framework for developing mental health-supporting green infrastructure that recognises sex-based differences
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