49 research outputs found
Stockholm, Sweden 2013
No full textIncludes descriptive index and illustrations.; Descriptive index, text and illustration on the verso.Color
Chicago, Illinois 2013
No full textSelected locations shown pictorially.; Includes descriptive index and illustrations.; Descriptive index, text and illustration on the verso.; Second printingColor
A narrative-based collaborative writing tool for coherent technical documents
No full textOne important feature of an effective document that makes it easy to read and understand is known as coherence. Technical documents produced collaboratively are often incoherent due to a lack of group consensus and misaligned contributions by the individual authors. However, current document planning techniques and writing tools do not provide explicit support for improving coherence. The goal of this research, therefore, is to develop and evaluate a new technique and tool that helps teams of authors to structure coherent technical documents. The coherence of a document can be attributed to the story (or narrative) it conveys to the reader. If this story is consistent and coherent, the same can be said about the document. A discourse theory such as Rhetorical Structure Theory (RST) that has been developed by linguists helps further to analyse and improve a narrative. RST explains the coherence of a text by virtue of relationships (such as “paragraph A justifies paragraph B”) between parts of the text. This research has combined the ideas from these parallel strands of research to develop a new document planning technique called narrative-based writing. The method involves writing down an explicit précis of the story (called a document narrative or DN) and then analysing it using RST. The DN and RST analysis are then used to structure the eventual document. To extend the usability of narrative-based writing to geographically-dispersed authors, I have designed and implemented a collaborative tool that allows co-authors to edit, analyse and review DNs. The thorough design for the tool uses a combination of three models (conceptual, business process and functional) culminating in a set of functions that enable collaborative narrative-based writing. This dissertation discusses how, in the future, these functions could be incorporated in existing collaborative writing tools. Implementing this tool, albeit in its current prototypic state, has been invaluable in understanding the complexities of modelling and manipulating DNs and RST structures. Initial investigations using the new technique and tool have been positive, encouraging me to continue the research and evaluation in this field
Regulatory Reform: Assessing the Government's Numbers
Get PDFThis paper provides the most comprehensive assessment to date of the costs and benefits of federal regulatory activities. The assessment, based on the government's own numbers, shows that the net benefits for final regulations promulgated from 1981 to mid-1996 approach a net present value of 280 billion if agencies rejected such regulations. Net benefits could also increase if agencies replace existing regulations with more efficient alternatives, or if agencies substantially improve regulatory programs. The efficiency of individual regulations varies by agency and by the type of risk the regulation is designed to reduce. Regulations from the Department of Transportation comprise over half of the total net benefits of final regulations, although they account for less than 10% of all regulations. The net benefits of regulations from the Environmental Protection Agency account for only about a third of total net benefits, primarily because of 19 Clean Air Act regulations with high net benefits, although two-thirds of all regulations are EPA regulations. On average, regulations that reduce cancer risk are less efficient than other social regulations, and EPA cancer regulations appear less efficient than other cancer regulations. Regulations that reduce the risk of car, fire, or work-related accidents are generally more efficient than regulations that reduce the risk of cancer and heart disease. The study also shows that the efficiency of regulations has not declined over time, as some scholars suggest. Furthermore, the introduction of formal regulatory oversight by the OMB does not appear to influence the cost-effectiveness of regulations. The paper shows that agency compliance with regulatory impact analysis requirements in Reagan's Executive Order 12291 and Clinton's Executive Order 12866, the basis for agency estimates of the costs and benefits of regulation, is usually superficial. As a result, the quality of such analyses is generally poor. Partly because of the poor quality of analyses, it appears that agencies do not often use the analyses to improve regulatory outcomes. If Congress and the White House are serious about regulatory reform, they must cooperate to enforce the regulatory impact analysis requirement. Successful enforcement requires high-level political support, statutory language requiring all agencies to adhere to established principles of economic analysis, and rigorous review of agency analyses by an independent entity. At this time, it is unclear whether law makers are willing to exert the political muscle necessary to achieve real reform.
Evaluating carbon offsets from forestry and energy projects
Get PDFUnder the Kyoto Protocol, industrial countries accept caps on their emissions of greenhouse gases. They are permitted to acquire offsetting emissions reductions from developing countries - which do not have emissions limitations - to assist in complying with these caps. Because these emissions reductions are defined against a hypothetical baseline, practical issues arise in ensuring that the reductions are genuine. Forestry-related emissions reduction projects are often thought to present greater difficulties in measurement and implementation, than energy-related emissions reduction projects. The author discusses how project characteristics affect the process for determining compliance with each of the criteria for qualifying. Those criteria are: 1) Additionality. Would these emissions reductions not have taken place without the project? 2) Baseline and systems boundaries (leakage). What would business-as-usual emissions have been without the project? And in this comparison, how broad should spatial, and temporal system boundaries be? 3) Measurement (or sequestration). How accurately can we measure actual with-project emissions levels? 4) Duration or permanence. Will the project have an enduring mitigating effect? 5) Local impact. Will the project benefit its neighbors? For all the criteria except permanence, it is difficult to find generic distinctions between land use change and forestry and energy projects, since both categories comprise diverse project types. The important distinctions among projects have to do with such things as: a) The level and distribution of the project's direct financial benefits. b) How much the project is integrated with the larger system. c) The project components'internal homogeneity and geographic dispersion. d) The local replicability of project technologies. Permanence is an issue specific to land use and forestry projects. The author describes various approaches to ensure permanence, or adjust credits for duration: the ton-year approach (focusing on the benefits from deferring climatic damage, and rewarding longer deferral); the combination approach (bundling current land use change and forestry emissions reductions with future reductions in the buyer's allowed amount); a technology-acceleration approach; and an insurance approach.Montreal Protocol,Environmental Economics&Policies,Climate Change,Decentralization,Global Environment Facility,Environmental Economics&Policies,Energy and Environment,Carbon Policy and Trading,Montreal Protocol,Climate Change
Rating e-mail personality at zero acquaintance
No full textElectronic media play an ever-increasing role in our daily communication. But howwell can personality traits be perceived through a short e-mail message? Workingindependently and under experimenter supervision, thirty judges each rated 18 short e-mail texts. These texts were produced by authors of known personality, who briefly described their recent activities, and were collected as part of a previously reported study which demonstrated linguistic characteristics of personality. As predicted by the perception literature, we nd that even with minimal textual cues there is relatively high agreement, for ratings of author Extraversion. However, agreement for Neuroticism ratings appears to be further reduced by the environment, especially between target and judges. In addition to reducing the cues available for personality rating, the study extends the previous work in two main ways: rst, it measures one further dimension of target personality|Psychoticism|rather than the separate factors Agreeableness and Conscientiousness (along with Openness); and secondly, it adopts additional, novel exemplar-based and subjective measures of personality perception
Measuring the effects of urban transportation policies on the environment : a survey of models
Get PDFMandating emission control devices in new cars is only one of the most obvious steps to address the problem of vehicle emissions. Others range from taxes on gasoline and parking to incentives to scrap old cars or move businesses out of the cities. There are models to simulate the engineering implications when changes are made to the vehicle fleet (such as the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's MOBILE 4), but other models are needed to capture individual behavior, for two reasons. First, behavior - for example, using certain vehicles - affects emissions, and thereby the effect of policies on pollution. Second, behavioral relations determine how much consumer welfare is affected by different policies - through other channels than the effect on air pollution. The author reviews existing models of urban transport and evaluates their ability to simulate the effects of different policies on emissions and on other variables relevant to welfare. He finds that: Little modeling work is done on developing countries, but some stylized facts (the greater importance of nonmotorized modes, of mopeds, of old vehicles, and of work-related trips, greater growth in urbanization, and greater growth in the urban vehicle stock) allow us to assess how well models from developed countries apply in industrial countries. Models vary greatly in complexity. The central question for users is whether they want detailed coverage of the spatial nature of pollution and congestion. The most comprehensive and detailed models also require the most data. The author proposes eclectic use of several models, since a model incorporating long-term responses, shorter-term responses, and emission consequences is not easily tractable. The author acknowledges the many complex links between policies (on the one hand) and welfare and air pollution (on the other), but says that research can often be narrowed according to available policy instruments, data availability, and the implications considered relevant. Often, simple models can improve the basis for policy evaluation, particularly when there are limited data and resources for research.Transport and Environment,Environmental Economics&Policies,Montreal Protocol,Roads&Highways,Climate Change
Sustaining menstrual regulation policy: a case study of the policy process in Bangladesh
Get PDFBangladesh introduced menstrual regulation (early abortion) into its national
family planning program in 1979, and for more than 20 years women with unwanted
pregnancies have been able to avail themselves of a relatively safe and accessible
service. Over the years, however, concern has been expressed about deficiencies in
the implementation of the policy, and by the mid-1990s, the menstrual regulation
(MR) policy was approaching a critical juncture. The introduction of health sector
reforms and the waning of international and domestic support raised questions
regarding the sustainability of the policy. This study was conducted to determine the
factors that influenced the development of and support for the MR policy in
Bangladesh, in order to explore how far those factors might influence future
sustainability.
The study used an analytic framework based on literature from the policy
field to test what factors were important in the policy process in Bangladesh.
Qualitative data was gathered from interviews and documents in an inductive
approach to determine the development of the MR policy, which was then subjected
to a retrospective analysis of the entire life cycle of the MR policy-how it came to
be placed on the policy agenda, how and why it was formulated the way it was, and
why it was not implemented as well as it could have been. Data gathered from
interviews and document reviews were then used in a political mapping exercise
undertaken in a prospective analysis for the policy, providing insights in relation to
the future sustainability of the MR policy.
The research suggested that the analytic framework used was helpful in
providing a systematic analysis of contextual conditions, agenda-setting
circumstances, and policy characteristics that could explain much of the variability in
the policy process. The role of international donors and attitudes toward religion
were found to be particularly relevant to explaining the policy process. The study
concluded that the MR policy would likely not be sustained in the future unless
purposeful action were taken to mobilise additional bureaucratic and political
resources in support of the policy
An investigation into the relationship between the educational context and the written product of university EFL students with implications for the teaching of writing
Get PDFThis study investigates the sources of difficulties that Damascus University learners face in their composition writing courses at the Department of English Language and
Literature. The research is carried out through a longitudinal study of both the context and the product of writing across a four year EFL writing course. Findings suggest that the writing problems that students face are inherent in the writing pedagogy in current practice at the University.
Most studies in ESL/EFL writing have looked at the final product in isolation from the context in which it has been produced. This work has attempted a study of the process of
teaching and evaluating writing at Damascus University across four years and analysed longitudinally, in the light of the contextual findings, the final products (written under the influence of the context described) of the same group of learners. Research on ESL writing too has focused mainly on the teaching of writing in smaller classes. This work is unique too in having to deal with a large class situation.
In addition to the introduction and conclusion, the thesis comprises six main chapters. The first chapter looks at the theoretical developments in the teaching of Li writing and
their impact on ESL,/EFL perceptions and writing pedagogies. Based on the insights gained from the above survey, chapters two and three attempt to evaluate the Damascus University context of teaching writing across the four year program. Chapters four and five analyse longitudinally the syntactic and the discourse level features of an authentic sample of students' written exam products, produced under the effect of the context of
writing described in chapters two and three. The aim of this is twofold, to investigate the influence of the context on the product of writing and to trace the development that learners make across the four year program. Chapter six incorporates the relevant
theoretical beliefs outlined in the work with an understanding of the Damascus University context to present suggestions for instructional practices that are to make of the writing course a more effective, purposeful and useful one.
The approach to writing pedagogy upheld in this work focuses on the 'process' and 'context' of writing without ignoring the 'product'. Its ultimate aim is not only the
improvement of the writing abilities of learners but also their growth and development through the composing experience
Conservation in an Islamic context a case study of Makkah
Get PDFThe Holy Qu’ rān contains many injunctions for Muslims to respect and conserve the natural environment but few address the built environment. Habitat at the time of the Prophet (PBOH) was in the vernacular and relatively impermanent. The first habitat was the cave, the second the tent and then simple flat roofed buildings of post and lintel construction made of mud and rubble. Later buildings were not indigenous but reflected the architectural styles and techniques of Muslim pilgrims from beyond the Arabian Peninsula. Permanent exotic buildings were later erected as reminders of holy places and events. This work advances a case to restore and preserve historic and religious sites in Makkah, Saudi Arabia. Makkah is the destination for millions of Muslim pilgrims who annually pay homage to Allah during the occasions of Hajj, Ramadan and Umra. The tranquillity and peaceful ambience that one associates with the holiest of Islamic experiences have, over the years, given way to jostling crowds of people who must be expediently housed, fed, transported, and protected. Due to the lack of planning and the insensitive but profitable development of the city, Makkah is in grave danger of becoming a bustling metropolis instead of a sanctuary where pilgrims gather to perform their religious rites and reaffirm their dedication to Allah. The author calls for professional planning and international cooperation to guide future development for this expanding and sensitive area. The author's ideas are grounded in practical and aesthetic study, therefore, the political, environmental and economic issues are examined in relationship to religious, historic and artistic values. The author makes proposals for a future Makkah that would provide pilgrims with the physical comforts, security, and serene environment they deserve—without destroying the city they came to visit. The author discusses preservation and conservation in the western world and the need for their acceptance in Muslim countries, the former being an aesthetic and intellectual concept sustained by law and the latter being the prescribed free expression of the individual unhindered by material considerations. Both worlds are rapidly being overwhelmed by materialism, but body, mind and spirit combine in making us aware of our surroundings and the way in what we see around us has come into being
