123,581 research outputs found
Reserved Seats, Parties, and Group Representation in Bosnia and Herzegovina : Special section in Ethnopolitics. Vol. 14, Bd. 4, S. 382-434
No full textIntroduction : Ethnocracy at the Heart of Europe
No full textThe Roma and the Jews make up less than half a per cent of the population of Bosnia and Herzegovina. And yet their leaders could sue their country, successfully, at the European Court of Human Rights, by claiming that the system of reserved seats in the state Presidency and the second chamber of Parliament is monopolised by and for the three ‘constituent peoples’ (Bosniaks, Croats, and Serbs) and, thus, discriminatory towards minorities and other citizens. The 2009 ruling of the Court in Strasbourg (Sejdić and Finci v. Bosnia and Herzegovina) has shaken the very cornerstones of this unique European consociational ethnocracy and has obliged their leaders to undertake deep constitutional reforms. The three articles that compose this Special Section explore the role played by the ‘national minorities’ (such as Roma and Jews) in Bosnian politics, in particular in relation to the introduction and implementation of reserved seats for national minorities introduced in local assemblies for the 2008 municipal elections. The articles analyse the use of the system of reserved seats by national minorities, the reactions and the strategies of the ethnic parties representing the three constituent peoples and the patterns of descriptive versus substantive representation of minority interests. Addressing the questions of ‘what’, ‘why’ and ‘how’ of political representation of national minorities in a consociational context, the articles in this Special Section show that Bosnian tripartite ethnocracy hardly supports the intrusion of ‘non-constitutive’ elements in its framework and that national minorities still face significant obstacles when it comes to representation of their interests in a political system mainly concerned with the group rights of constituent peoples
Building Good Habits. Longitudinal Studies on Malleable Psychological Factors, Reduced Motivational Interference, and Facilitated Goal Attainment
No full textStojanovic M. Building Good Habits. Longitudinal Studies on Malleable Psychological Factors, Reduced Motivational Interference, and Facilitated Goal Attainment. Bielefeld: Universität Bielefeld; 2023.The goal of this dissertation was simple, but not easy: reduce motivational interference in self-regulated behavior with a low-threshold, scalable intervention. When choosing an activity (e.g., studying for an upcoming exam), we simultaneously decide to forgo other activities (e.g., watching Netflix). If we now feel we want or should do a forgone activity, we experience a motivational conflict between the focal and the forgone activity. The effect of this conflict is that it interferes with the current motivation – motivational interference – for the focal activity by increasing distractibility, making one think about alternative activities, triggering task switching, worsening mood and lowering persistence. We want to make the focal activity more resilient against these external attacks by increased behavioral automaticity, which translates to: building habits. Building habits is simple, but not easy: repeat a behavior in a stable context. A habit is an automatized behavioral sequence (e.g., summarizing lecture slides) that is triggered by a context cue (e.g., after brushing teeth in the evening).
Put simply, the problem is motivational interference in self-regulated behavior, the mechanism to counteract it is behavioral automaticity (i.e., habits), and the method of delivery is a simple app-based intervention. Three datasets were generated and analyzed for this dissertation with a total of N = 7,424 unique habit repetitions reported by N = 404 people. Two of the datasets stem from controlled studies with university students building learning habits over a six-week time frame, and one dataset contains user data from a published iOS app. For the first paper, I created a habit building app, which led the participants through a self-guided, structured, study-habit definition process and tracked relevant data. The app was then slightly modified to be used for any habit and published on Apple’s AppStore under the name Grow – Habit Builder (Stojanovic, 2019), which generated the user dataset. The second study dataset was generated using the survey tool Qualtrics (Qualtrics, 2021). Each paper is based on one of these datasets. Additionally, Paper 2 and Paper 3 double-test their core hypotheses with a study dataset and the user dataset.
To achieve the allegedly simple goal of this dissertation – reduce motivational interference via a low-threshold habit building intervention – I set out to answer three core questions: Does it work? Does it generalize? Which factors support it?
**Does Automaticity Reduce Motivational Interference?**
Proof for this fundamental mechanism is essential. Otherwise, habit building would not qualify as a solution for the experience of motivational interference during self-regulated behavior. We tested this in Paper 1 (Stojanovic et al., 2020). In that paper, we showed that the automaticity score from the current habit repetition predicted less motivational interference as well as less motivational want conflicts during the next habit repetition (N = 91 students, N = 2,574 habit repetitions).
**Does the Finding From the Previous Question Generalize to Self-Guided, Freely Chosen Habits by Real-Life App Users Without Study Incentives?**
This question targets the low-threshold part of the overarching dissertation goal and seeks to generalize the found mechanisms from self-regulated studying to freely chosen, beneficial, self-regulated behavior. This would increase the reach of the found explanations and predictions significantly from study behavior in mainly female psychology students to a broader range of domains and subjects. We tested this in Paper 2 (Stojanovic et al., 2021). In this paper, we showed that automaticity predicted less motivational interference in real users of Grow – Habit Builder from all over the world across a broad range of beneficial habit classes such as studying, exercise, meditation, and productivity (N = 196 users, N = 265 habits, N = 2,232 habit repetitions).
**Which Malleable Factors Support Habit Building?**
By answering the first question with yes, we established the core functionality: Yes, we can fight pesky motivational interference with habit building. By answering the second question with yes, we established generalizability: Yes, this mechanism is true outside the study setting and for other beneficial habits outside the realm of academic learning, and it can be promoted with a simple, self-guided, low-threshold, app-based intervention for people from many different countries. This makes successful habit building valuable and easy to implement. By focussing on this third question – which malleable factors support habit building – I sought to optimize habit building, so that its utility can be leveraged even better. Specifically, we investigated the role of self-efficacy (Paper 2; Stojanovic et al., 2021) and context stability (Paper 3; Stojanovic et al., 2022) in the habit building process. In Paper 2, we showed that general self-efficacy predicted higher automaticity scores (N = 91 students, N = 2,574 habit repetitions) and that habit-specific self-efficacy of the current habit repetition predicted automaticity of the next habit repetition and vice versa resulting in a virtuous cycle of growing automaticity and self-efficacy (N = 196 users, N = 265 habits, N = 2,232 habit repetitions). In Paper 3, we showed that context stability – the time and place where a habit is repeatedly performed – predicted higher automaticity and higher habit repetition goal (the goal set for one habit repetition) attainment scores (N = 95 students, N = 2,482 habit repetitions; N = 218 users, N = 308 habits, N = 2,368 habit repetitions). Malleable factors were chosen over fixed ones such as IQ or personality traits, so that the found mechanisms can be applied to a broad audience in order to improve habit building success by focussing on controllable variables that can be shaped over time independently of relatively fixed individual characteristics.
Acknowledging the infinite nature of scientific progress, this synopsis will not end with the answer to the last research question but inspire further inquiry. Exploratory analyses conducted for this synopsis, show that (1) reduced motivational interference supports habit repetition goal attainment and (2) that even the relatively stable factors of general study habit strength, self-control, and general self-efficacy increased after a habit building intervention in pre-post comparisons. This points to promising future research questions on further desirable outcomes related to intentional habit building. The answers above constitute the scientific contribution of the dissertation and serve the practical cause to make the execution of complex tasks not simple, but easy
A Multi-Language Comparison of Influences on Author Verification using Character N-Grams
No full textWe create a new multi-language corpus for author verification based on Wikipedia talkpages, and evaluate the influence that differences in topic and time have on character n-gram author profiles. Topic alignment between two texts is found to increase author verification precision, and an authors writing style is found to change over time, but not more significantly after 3 years than after 1 year.Information ArchitectureWISElectrical Engineering, Mathematics and Computer Scienc
Appropriate Similarity Measures for Author Cocitation Analysis
No full textWe 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
The vanishing author in computer-generated works: a critical analysis of recent Australian case law
No full textAbstract
The use of software is ubiquitous in the creation of many copyright works, yet the requirement in copyright law that every work have a human author who engages in independent intellectual effort means that its use may prevent copyright subsistence. Several recent Australian cases have refocused attention on authorship as an essential criterion of copyright subsistence, and these cases suggest that much computer-produced output may be authorless and thus lack copyright protection. This article, the first in a two-part series, analyses how each case deals with the question of authorship of computer-produced works and why the use of software diminishes copyright protection for a significant number of computer-generated works. The article critiques the application of conventional notions of human authorship developed in the pre-computer age to modern productions and suggests alternative approaches to authorship that satisfy both the major objectives of copyright policy and the need to adapt to the computer age. The article argues that, without a broader judicial approach to authorship of computer-generated works, Parliament must remedy the lacuna in protection for these ‘authorless’ works. Possible solutions for reform are suggested. In a forthcoming article, the author comprehensively examines those reform proposals
Context Stability in Habit Building Increases Automaticity and Goal Attainment
No full textStojanovic M, Grund A, Fries S. Context Stability in Habit Building Increases Automaticity and Goal Attainment. Frontiers in Psychology. 2022;13: 883795.In this paper, we investigate the effects of context stability on automaticity and goal attainment in intentional habit building. We used hierarchical growth curve modeling and multilevel mediation to test our hypotheses on two datasets. In Study 1, N=95 university students (N=2,482 habit repetitions) built new study habits over a period of 6weeks with manipulated context stability. One group was instructed to constantly vary the context of their habit repetitions by changing rooms and times and the other group was instructed to keep the context of habit performance stable. In Study 2, N=308 habits (N=2,368 habit repetitions) from N=218 users of a published habit building app were analyzed without manipulating but measuring context stability. We found the same pattern in both datasets: Context stability predicted more automaticity and higher habit repetition goal attainment. We also found that the effect of context stability on habit repetition goal attainment was partially mediated by automaticity in both datasets. These results show that context does not only act as a trigger for habit instigation but also has an ongoing effect on habit execution. Copyright © 2022 Stojanovic, Grund and Fries
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