1,720,965 research outputs found
Going Beyond Counting First Authors in Author Co-citation Analysis
Get PDFThe present study examines one of the fundamental aspects of author co-citation analysis (ACA) - the way co-citation
counts are defined. Co-citation counting provides the data on which all subsequent statistical analyses and mappings
are based, and we compare ACA results based on two different types of co-citation counting - the traditional type that
only counts the first one among a cited work's authors on the one hand and a non-traditional type that takes into
account the first 5 authors of a cited work on the other hand. Results indicate that the picture produced through this non-traditional author co-citation counting contains more coherent author groups and is therefore considerably clearer. However, this picture represents fewer specialties in the research field being studied than that produced through the traditional first-author co-citation counting when the same number of top-ranked authors is selected and analyzed. Reasons for these effects are discussed
Drought Index-Based Insurance for the US Cattle Ranching Industry
Get PDFThe recent availability of federally-subsidized rainfall-index insurance for US grazing livestock producers provides a previously absent level of financial support that has long been common in the crop production industry. This development is important for the economic well-being of the small-scale rancher who faces the ever-present risk of drought. When drought hits the ranch, forage-production is reduced, expensive supplementary feed becomes necessary, and often the rancher must sell cattle into a flooded local market. In recent years, particularly severe national-scale droughts have caused large economic losses for agricultural producers, renewing interest in drought risks mitigation strategies. Over these years, weather-based index insurance has become increasingly popular for the mitigation of such risks because it is designed to avoid many of the pitfalls that make loss-based insurance inefficient. By basing loss on an indicator and not experienced loss, expenses associated with profit-seeking behavior by policyholders can be significantly reduced. This feature promises to lessen operation costs, decrease premiums, and expand possible coverage to a larger number of people, but will only be effective to the degree that the index accurately indicates loss. The Pasture, Rangeland, and Forage (PRF) rainfall-index insurance program assumes that rainfall is highly correlated with the rangeland forage. However, cumulative rainfall is only one factor of many that determines rangeland health, creating a risk of non-payment. The existence of a myriad of drought indices specifically designed to monitor the impacts of drought begs the question; why not indicate drought-induced loss with a drought index? A drought index would provide the same efficiencies as the rainfall index while potentially reducing the risk of non-payment when there are losses. In this study, various drought indices are assessed for their ability to indicate the economic impacts of drought in the US live-cattle market, and subsequently tested as experimental alternatives to the rainfall index in the PRF. The results demonstrate that they explain similar amounts of variance in cattle weights at live-auctions as the rainfall index but incentivize appropriate growing season protection and have the potential to significantly reduce the chances of missed payouts during drought without creating actuarially unmanageable payout patterns
Variations on the Author
Get PDF“Variations on the Author” discusses two of Eduardo Coutinho’s recent films (Um Dia na Vida, from 2010, and Últimas Conversas, posthumously released in 2015) and their contribution to the general question of documentary authorship. The director’s filmography is characterized by a consistent yet self-effacing form of authorial self-inscription: Coutinho often features as an interviewer that rather than express opinions propels discourses; an interviewer that is good at listening. This mode of self-inscription characterizes him as an author who is not expressive but who is nonetheless markedly present on the screen. In Um Dia na Vida, however, Coutinho is completely absent form the image, while Últimas Conversas, on the contrary, includes a confessional prologue that moves the director from the margins to the center of his films. This article examines the ways in which these works stand out in the filmography of a director who offers new insights into the notion of cinematic authorship
Appropriate Similarity Measures for Author Cocitation Analysis
Get PDFWe provide a number of new insights into the methodological discussion about author cocitation analysis. We first argue that the use of the Pearson correlation for measuring the similarity between authors’ cocitation profiles is not very satisfactory. We then discuss what kind of similarity measures may be used as an alternative to the Pearson correlation. We consider three similarity measures in particular. One is the well-known cosine. The other two similarity measures have not been used before in the bibliometric literature. Finally, we show by means of an example that our findings have a high practical relevance.information science;Pearson correlation;cosine;similarity measure;author cocitation analysis
Drought Index-Based Insurance for the US Cattle Ranching Industry
Get PDFThe recent availability of federally-subsidized rainfall-index insurance for US grazing livestock producers provides a previously absent level of financial support that has long been common in the crop production industry. This development is important for the economic well-being of the small-scale rancher who faces the ever-present risk of drought. When drought hits the ranch, forage-production is reduced, expensive supplementary feed becomes necessary, and often the rancher must sell cattle into a flooded local market. In recent years, particularly severe national-scale droughts have caused large economic losses for agricultural producers, renewing interest in drought risks mitigation strategies. Over these years, weather-based index insurance has become increasingly popular for the mitigation of such risks because it is designed to avoid many of the pitfalls that make loss-based insurance inefficient. By basing loss on an indicator and not experienced loss, expenses associated with profit-seeking behavior by policyholders can be significantly reduced. This feature promises to lessen operation costs, decrease premiums, and expand possible coverage to a larger number of people, but will only be effective to the degree that the index accurately indicates loss. The Pasture, Rangeland, and Forage (PRF) rainfall-index insurance program assumes that rainfall is highly correlated with the rangeland forage. However, cumulative rainfall is only one factor of many that determines rangeland health, creating a risk of non-payment. The existence of a myriad of drought indices specifically designed to monitor the impacts of drought begs the question; why not indicate drought-induced loss with a drought index? A drought index would provide the same efficiencies as the rainfall index while potentially reducing the risk of non-payment when there are losses. In this study, various drought indices are assessed for their ability to indicate the economic impacts of drought in the US live-cattle market, and subsequently tested as experimental alternatives to the rainfall index in the PRF. The results demonstrate that they explain similar amounts of variance in cattle weights at live-auctions as the rainfall index but incentivize appropriate growing season protection and have the potential to significantly reduce the chances of missed payouts during drought without creating actuarially unmanageable payout patterns
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Behavioral and Experimental Insights on Consumer Decisions and the Environment
No full textIn the following essays, I apply theoretical insights and experimental methods from behavioral science to address three questions at the intersection of environmental economics and consumer behavior.
In Chapter 1, I use an experimental intervention to explore the role of salience in the willingness to pay for climate change mitigation. The long time horizon between the mitigation decision and the benefits of that decision may hinder optimal investment in climate change mitigation. The immediate costs of the decision loom large in the decision-maker's mind while the future benefits have lower prominence in their decisions. As a result, climate change mitigation decisions may be prone to salience bias. In an online randomized control experiment, I test whether tasks focusing attention on the risks and challenges of climate change will increase the willingness to pay for climate change mitigation. In the Letter treatment, the writing task is framed as a message directed to a particular individual living in the year 2050. In Essay treatment, the writing task is framed as an essay on the risks and challenges of climate change. I find that compared to a control group, both writing tasks that focus attention on the risks and challenges of climate change increase the willingness to donate to a climate change mitigation non-profit organization. However, the two treatments appear to operate through different pathways. These findings contribute to the understanding of how to effectively bridge the psychological distance between choice and consequence for climate change mitigation. They also have broader implications for the interplay between psychological distance and salience bias in a broad range of decision-making contexts.
In Chapter 2, coauthored with Joseph Aldy, we model the consumer welfare impacts of gasoline price volatility under expected utility theory and prospect theory. The salience of gasoline prices among the U.S. public reflects consumer concerns about the price, and the uncertainty around the price, of gasoline. Volatility in gasoline prices reduces the ability of credit-constrained households to smooth consumption, and could result in substantial welfare losses for such households. Volatility reduces the information value of prices, which can undermine consumer decision-making for new investments. Gasoline price volatility may also reflect energy and environmental policies. As decision-makers compare the welfare impacts of policies that accomplish the same goal (e.g. reduce carbon dioxide emissions) but generate different levels of volatility in energy prices (e.g. fixed carbon tax compared to a fluctuating allowance price), the effects of consumer price volatility are often left out of the analysis. The goal of this research is to understand how energy price volatility affects consumer welfare. Focusing specifically on the gasoline market, we estimate the risk premium for increased gasoline price volatility due to a carbon allowance market. Under an expected utility theory model, households with highly inelastic demand or high-risk aversion tend to prefer fixed prices but have low risk premiums. Under a prospect theory model with reference-dependent utility, loss aversion leads to a strong preference for fixed prices with risk premiums around 2% of the average price. The salience of gasoline prices creates a strong reference point and the level of attention focused on "pain at the pump" when prices rise sharply implies loss aversion. Thus, prospect theory may be particularly well-suited to this market setting. By clarifying the welfare impacts of gasoline price volatility, we will better understand the full set of tradeoffs among energy policy options that have differential effects on fuel price volatility.
In Chapter 3, I use a series of experiments to explore the impacts of eco-friendly labels on perceptions and evaluations of product attributes. Expectations may affect how people evaluate product attributes. If people expect different levels of performance from eco-products and regular products, then the presence of an eco-product label may bias their evaluations. Six experiments examine how expectations of the objective performance of eco-products affect perceptions of those products and subsequent product preferences. Holding objective performance constant, I find that prior expectations bias the evaluations of eco-product attributes. Expecting energy efficient bulbs to generate unpleasant lighting causes people to evaluate the lighting as unpleasant; expecting toilet tissue from recycled paper to be coarse causes people to evaluate the toilet paper as coarse. Using a study designed to isolate the effects on sensory perception, I find that expectations do not bias the sensory perception of product attributes. Instead, I find that consumers follow Bayesian predictions of combining prior expectations with a new perceptual signal to form posterior evaluations. This research may help explain the slower than expected take-up of energy efficient products (referred to as the "energy efficiency gap"), and the persistence of beliefs that eco-products underperform standard products, when many objectively do not.Public PolicyEnvironmental Economics; Behavioral Economics; Climate Change; Energy; Environmental Policy; Salience Theory; Price Volatility; Labeling; Consumer Behavior; Consumer Welfare; Perception
Dispelling the Myths Behind First-author Citation Counts
Get PDFWe conducted a full-scale evaluative citation analysis study of scholars in the XML research field to explore just how different from each other author rankings resulting from different citation counting methods actually are, and to demonstrate the capability of emerging data and tools on the Web in supporting more realistic citation counting methods. Our results contest some common arguments for the continued
use of first-author citation counts in the evaluation of scholars, such as high correlations between author rankings by first-author citation counts and other citation
counting methods, and high costs of using more realistic citation counting methods that are not well-supported by the ISI databases. It is argued that increasingly available digital full text research papers make it possible for citation analysis studies to go beyond what the ISI databases have directly supported and to employ more
sophisticated methods
koamabayili/VECTRON-author-checklist: VECTRON author checklist
No full textWe have done our best to complete the author checklist relating to the use of animals in the hut study. Note that the objective for the hut study was to evaluate the IRS treatment applications for residual efficacy against Anopheles mosquitoes, including the local An. coluzzii mosquito population. Cows were only used to attract mosquitoes into the huts and no tests were carried out directly on the cows. The author checklist is intended for use with studies where experiments are carried out on animals, which is why we have had such difficulty in completing this for the hut study, as many of the questions do not relate to how the cows were used
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