9,129 research outputs found
Wine Roads in Greece: A Cooperation for the Development of Local Tourism in Rural Areas
No full textAn association of Wine Roads was developed in Greece at the beginning of the 1990s in an attempt to boost rural tourism. The association was created by wine producers in the regions of Macedonia and was then extended to Epirus, Thessaly and Thrace. Its main purpose has been the promotion of wine companies and the association's regional members, while its specific targets have been the development of local tourism, the support of cultural heritage and the improvement of product quality and related services. The Wine Roads initiative has received substantial financial support from the European Union and the State of Greece, mainly through the LEADER II program. However, socioeconomic results for the participating companies and regions appear to differ. An assessment using a questionnaire showed a positive effect on the enhancement of relations among members, the increase in tourist visits, publicity for the regions and cultural events. In contrast, there have been no significant positive effects on employment. Finally, it should be noted that some of the participating districts and companies have been more active and have taken better advantage of this initiative.Wine roads, rural tourism, cooperation, financing, LEADER program, Greece, Community/Rural/Urban Development,
Trypanosomatids are common and diverse parasites of Drosophila
No full textDrosophila melanogaster is an important model system of immunity and parasite resistance, yet most studies use parasites that do not naturally infect this organism. We have studied trypanosomatids in natural populations to assess the prevalence and diversity of these gut parasites. We collected several species of Drosophila from Europe and surveyed them for trypanosomatids using conserved primers for two genes. We have used the conserved GAPDH sequence to construct a phylogenetic tree and the highly variable spliced leader RNA to assay genetic diversity. All 5 of the species that we examined were infected, and the average prevalence ranged from 1 to 6%. There are several different groups of trypanosomatids, related to other monoxenous Trypanosomatidae. These may represent new trypanosomatid species and were found in different species of European Drosophila from different geographical locations. The detection of a little studied natural pathogen in D. melanogaster and related species provides new opportunities for research into both the Drosophila immune response and the evolution of hosts and parasites.</p
Social Identity and Voter Turnout
No full textThis paper uses the unique social structure of Arab communities to examine the effect of social identity on voter turnout. We first show that voters are more likely to vote for a candidate who shares their social group (signified by last name) as compared to other candidates. Using last name as a measure of group affiliation, we find an inverted U-shaped relationship between group size and voter turnout which is consistent with theoretical models that reconcile the paradox of voting by incorporating groups behavior.voter turnout, paradox of voting, social identity, local elections
Leadership perceptions of third grade students based on both gender of the leader and gender of the student
No full textPlan BThe purpose of this study was to determine the relationship between the gender of third grade students at Longfellow Elementary and their rating of perceived leadership effectiveness of both males and females as measured by the Kapanke-Sproul scale. The subjects for this study were all of the third grade students at Longfellow Elementary School. This study utilized four pictures with written narrative descriptions attached. The students were each given a packet of four pictures with written narrative descriptions. Each packet contained an effective male leader, an effective female leader, an ineffective male leader, and an ineffective female leader. Half of the students received a picture of a male described as an effective leader while the other half of the students received a picture of a female with the same written description. Next, half of the students received a picture of a female with the description of an effective leader, and the other half of the students received a picture of a male with the same written description. Thirdly, half of the class was given a picture and written description of an ineffective male leader, while the other half of the students were given a picture of a female with the same written description. Lastly, half of the class was given a picture of a female with the a written description of an ineffective leader, and the other half of the class was given a picture of a male with the same written description. At the bottom of each written narrative description there were two questions, and the students were asked to rate their perception of effective leadership ability for each individual on a "Likert Scale." The results were analyzed to determine if gender of the leaders affected how they were perceived by the students. The results were also analyzed to determine if gender of the student affected whether males or females were perceived to be more effective leaders To this researcher's surprise, none of the findings were statistically significant. When looking at the raw data, it appeared that male students perceived male leaders as more effective and female students perceived female leaders to be more effective, but when the data was analyzed this was not the case. The data analysis showed that generally, males and females are perceived as equally effective, regardless of the gender of the student or the leader. The collective findings of this study resulted in the conclusion to accept the Null Hypothesis that there is no statistically significant difference in perceived leadership effectiveness of adult males versus females based upon gender of the third grade students. It is important to study gender issues to help understand what still needs to change to help eliminate sex-role stereotypes in society, occupations, and leadership roles. This information was used to make suggestions for future guidance curriculum to ensure gender equality
The evolution of leader-follower reciprocity: The theory of service-for-prestige
No full textCopyright © 2014 Price and Van Vugt. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.This article has been made available through the Brunel Open Access Publishing Fund.We describe the service-for-prestige theory of leadership, which proposes that voluntary leader–follower relations evolved in humans via a process of reciprocal exchange that generated adaptive benefits for both leaders and followers. We propose that although leader–follower relations first emerged in the human lineage to solve problems related to information sharing and social coordination, they ultimately evolved into exchange relationships whereby followers could compensate leaders for services which would otherwise have been prohibitively costly for leaders to provide. In this exchange, leaders incur costs to provide followers with public goods, and in return, followers incur costs to provide leaders with prestige (and associated fitness benefits). Because whole groups of followers tend to gain from leader-provided public goods, and because prestige is costly for followers to produce, the provisioning of prestige to leaders requires solutions to the “free rider” problem of disrespectful followers (who benefit from leader services without sharing the costs of producing prestige). Thus service-for-prestige makes the unique prediction that disrespectful followers of beneficial leaders will be targeted by other followers for punitive sentiment and/or social exclusion. Leader–follower relations should be more reciprocal and mutually beneficial when leaders and followers have more equal social bargaining power. However, as leaders gain more relative power, and their high status becomes less dependent on their willingness to pay the costs of benefitting followers, service-for-prestige predicts that leader–follower relations will become based more on leaders’ ability to dominate and exploit rather than benefit followers. We review evidential support for a set of predictions made by service-for-prestige, and discuss how service-for-prestige relates to social neuroscience research on leadership
A New Look at Blockchain Leader Election: Simple, Efficient, Sustainable and Post-Quantum
No full textIn this work, we study the blockchain leader election problem. The purpose of such protocols is to elect a leader who decides on the next block to be appended to the blockchain, for each block proposal round. Solutions to this problem are vital for the security of blockchain systems. We introduce an efficient blockchain leader election method with security based solely on standard assumptions for cryptographic hash functions (rather than public-key cryptographic assumptions) and that does not involve a racing condition as in Proof-of-Work based approaches. Thanks to the former feature, our solution provides the highest confidence in security, even in the post-quantum era. A particularly scalable application of our solution is in the Proof-of-Stake setting, and we investigate our solution in the Algorand blockchain system. We believe our leader election approach can be easily adapted to a range of other blockchain settings. At the core of Algorand's leader election is a verifiable random function (VRF). Our approach is based on introducing a simpler primitive which still suffices for the blockchain leader election problem. In particular, we analyze the concrete requirements in an Algorand-like blockchain setting to accomplish leader election, which leads to the introduction of indexed VRF (iVRF). An iVRF satisfies modified uniqueness and pseudorandomness properties (versus a full-fledged VRF) that enable an efficient instantiation based on a hash function without requiring any complicated zero-knowledge proofs of correct PRF evaluation. We further extend iVRF to an authenticated iVRF with forward-security, which meets all the requirements to establish an Algorand-like consensus. Our solution is simple, flexible and incurs only a 32-byte additional overhead when combined with the current best solution to constructing a forward-secure signature (in the post-quantum setting). We implemented our (authenticated) iVRF proposal in C language on a standard computer and show that it significantly outperforms other quantum-safe VRF proposals in almost all metrics. Particularly, iVRF evaluation and verification can be executed in 0.02 ms, which is even faster than ECVRF used in Algorand.Green Open Access added to TU Delft Institutional Repository ‘You share, we take care!’ – Taverne project https://www.openaccess.nl/en/you-share-we-take-care Otherwise as indicated in the copyright section: the publisher is the copyright holder of this work and the author uses the Dutch legislation to make this work public.Cyber Securit
Numbers - Women's Bible Study Leader Guide Learning Contentment in a Culture of More
No full textSay no to the desire for bigger, better, faster.Cover -- Title -- Copyright -- Contents -- About the Author -- Introduction -- Getting Started -- Tips for Tackling Five Common Challenges -- Basic Leader Helps -- Introductory Session -- Week 1: Content in Deliverance -- Exodus 1-15 -- Week 2: Content in Preparation -- Numbers 1-10 -- Week 3: Content in Uncertainty -- Numbers 11-14 -- Week 4: Content in Obedience -- Numbers 15-20 -- Week 5: Content in Opposition -- Numbers 21-26 -- Week 6: Content in Blessings -- Numbers 27-36 -- Digging Deeper Week 1 Preview: The Names of God -- Video Viewer Guide AnswersSay no to the desire for bigger, better, faster.Description based on publisher supplied metadata and other sources.Electronic reproduction. Ann Arbor, Michigan : ProQuest Ebook Central, YYYY. Available via World Wide Web. Access may be limited to ProQuest Ebook Central affiliated libraries
ESSAYS IN ADVERTISING MESSAGES, MASS MEDIA, AND PRODUCT POSITIONING
No full textIn my dissertation, I apply emerging big data methodologies to measure the effects of advertising content and detect potential product segments. First, I explore whether advertising messages can change the topics reported in mass media. Specifically, I examine whether Dove’s real beauty campaign increased the incidence of real-beauty-related topics in newspapers. Using a topic model, I segment beauty-related topics and identify topics related to real beauty. The number of sentences labeled as real beauty topics increases during the campaign. While the Dove campaign’s significant impact on real beauty topics around the time of the campaign holds even in newspapers without Unilever ads, the impact is larger in newspapers containing Unilever ads. Overall, this evidence is consistent with both a mass media’s public service role and an advertiser pressure influencing mass media content.
In my next study, joint work with Avi Goldfarb and Trevor Snider, I introduce a method for identifying potentially related products using topological data analysis (TDA). From both simulated and real consumer purchase data, I show that “loopy segments” in TDA can connect regionally separated local products through national products, while standard clustering methods such as hierarchical clustering cannot.
Lastly, I test whether comparative advertising reposition rival brands closer together. Using Google Trends’ aggregate consumer search data, I analyze Samsung’s U.S. television comparative advertising campaign against Apple’s iPhone. I count co-occurrence of searches for brand pairs (e.g. Samsung Apple) and their brand-product attributes (e.g. Samsung screen, Apple Screen), to respectively map brand and product space. I find that advertised rival brands become closer together in both brand and product spaces but not significant in product space. My results suggest that a lower share brand may benefit from comparative advertising against a market leader by forcing itself to be more considered alongside a market leader when consumers search brands.Ph.D
ESSAYS IN ADVERTISING MESSAGES, MASS MEDIA, AND PRODUCT POSITIONING
No full textIn my dissertation, I apply emerging big data methodologies to measure the effects of advertising content and detect potential product segments. First, I explore whether advertising messages can change the topics reported in mass media. Specifically, I examine whether Dove’s real beauty campaign increased the incidence of real-beauty-related topics in newspapers. Using a topic model, I segment beauty-related topics and identify topics related to real beauty. The number of sentences labeled as real beauty topics increases during the campaign. While the Dove campaign’s significant impact on real beauty topics around the time of the campaign holds even in newspapers without Unilever ads, the impact is larger in newspapers containing Unilever ads. Overall, this evidence is consistent with both a mass media’s public service role and an advertiser pressure influencing mass media content.
In my next study, joint work with Avi Goldfarb and Trevor Snider, I introduce a method for identifying potentially related products using topological data analysis (TDA). From both simulated and real consumer purchase data, I show that “loopy segments” in TDA can connect regionally separated local products through national products, while standard clustering methods such as hierarchical clustering cannot.
Lastly, I test whether comparative advertising reposition rival brands closer together. Using Google Trends’ aggregate consumer search data, I analyze Samsung’s U.S. television comparative advertising campaign against Apple’s iPhone. I count co-occurrence of searches for brand pairs (e.g. Samsung Apple) and their brand-product attributes (e.g. Samsung screen, Apple Screen), to respectively map brand and product space. I find that advertised rival brands become closer together in both brand and product spaces but not significant in product space. My results suggest that a lower share brand may benefit from comparative advertising against a market leader by forcing itself to be more considered alongside a market leader when consumers search brands.Ph.D
sj-docx-1-wso-10.1177_17474930231217670 – Supplemental material for Lung cancer is associated with acute ongoing cerebral ischemia: A population-based study
No full textSupplemental material, sj-docx-1-wso-10.1177_17474930231217670 for Lung cancer is associated with acute ongoing cerebral ischemia: A population-based study by Jonathan Naftali, Rani Barnea, Ruth Eliahou, Keshet Pardo, Assaf Tolkovsky, Meital Adi, Vadim Hasminski, Walid Saliba, Sivan Bloch, Guy Raphaeli, Avi Leader and Eitan Auriel in International Journal of Stroke</p
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