Critical Points In Time Research Articles

Sensitive intervention points: a strategic approach to climate action

Abstract While some countries are making progress reducing greenhouse gas emissions, few are progressing rapidly enough to be on track to reach net zero emissions by mid-century. The transition to net zero involves deep structural transformation of the global economy and its associated complex socio-technical systems. Here, we set out a conceptual framework to identify ‘sensitive intervention points’ (SIPs) in systems where a small or moderately-sized intervention could drive outsized impacts and transformational change. These points take three forms: (i) critical tipping points, such as a critical price threshold, (ii) critical nodes in networks, such as an influential actor in a social network, and (iii) critical points in time, where windows of opportunity for change open up. We also propose an assessment methodology for prioritizing interventions in terms of their potential impacts, risks, and ease of implementation. We apply our framework and assessment methodology to evaluate a list of proposed interventions for accelerating global decarbonization. Promising interventions include investing in key clean energy technologies with consistent cost declines, introducing central bank policies to reduce the value of polluting collateral, and enhancing climate-related financial risk disclosure.

Die Höhen und Tiefen der Europäischen Union als Akteur in der internationalen Klimapolitik

At international climate conferences, the European Union (EU) and its member states both are negotiating partners. The EU signs the treaties to protect the climate, the member states ratify and translate them into national policy. Based on the literature on actorness, we identify different dimensions in which the EU’s actor quality is articulated. Actorness has internal dimensions, such as the transfer of responsibilities, and external dimensions, such as the recognition as a contracting party by other states. Actorness, however, cannot be grasped by analysing institutions alone, but also arises discursively and situationally. We trace EU actorness for four critical points in time in international climate policy and can thus show that actorness in the policy field has increased overall over time, but that the full potential has not yet been exploited. In some dimensions, a temporary decline in actorness could be observed, especially at the Copenhagen summit. The analysis of actorness can also contribute to the explanation of a possible lack of effectiveness.

Reliability and validity of the reduced Spanish version of the Prenatal Breastfeeding Self‐Efficacy Scale

Breastfeeding self-efficacy is a relevant predictor of exclusive breastfeeding during the first six months of life. The Prenatal Breastfeeding Self-Efficacy Scale (PBSES) is a 20-item tool developed to determine breastfeeding self-efficacy during pregnancy. Our study aimed to assess the structural validity and psychometric characteristics of the PBSES and to explore item reduction according to the statistical criteria for parsimony and incremental validity. In this study, conducted in six hospitals in eastern Spain, we recruited 1183 women with healthy, full-term, single-birth newborns. Data on sociodemographic, breastfeeding-related variables, and the PBSES, were obtained from self-administered questionnaires during the third trimester of pregnancy, at postpartum discharge, and 5 months postpartum, and from a phone survey 12 months postpartum. Item reduction was conducted after revising the PBSES item floor and ceiling effects, interitem correlations, and item-score relationships with breastfeeding-status variables during follow-up. The factorial structure of the short form of the PBSES (PBSES-SF) was tested using both exploratory and confirmatory approaches. After item reduction, the confirmatory factor analysis of the 12 remaining items of the PBSES-SF revealed adequate fit statistics for a three-factor structure and a second-order factor. Internal consistency was measured using the Cronbach's α coefficient of the PBSES-SF (0.86). We provided evidence on the discriminant validity of the PBSES-SF by comparing its scores between known groups, convergent validity by examining its correlations with other variables, and predictive validity by assessing the association of PBSES-SF scores with breastfeeding behavior at critical points in time during the first postpartum year.

Finite-element-based prediction of moisture-induced crack patterns for cross sections of solid wood and glued laminated timber exposed to a realistic climate condition

Moisture may significantly influence the dimensions and behavior of wooden elements and, thus, it is important to consider within both serviceability as well as ultimate limit state designs. Dimensional changes, also called swelling (during wetting) and shrinkage (during drying), are non-uniform due to the direction-dependent expansion coefficients of wood and usually lead to eigenstresses. If these exceed certain strength values, cracking may occur, which reduces the resistance to external loads, especially to shear stresses. The current standard Eurocode5 takes these circumstances very simplified into account, by so-called service classes, defined based on the surrounding climate and average moisture levels over the course of a year. Accordingly, reduction factors for strength values and cross section widths are assigned.For a better understanding of the climate-induced changes in wooden beams, we exposed 18 different beams with varying cross sections to a representative climate of Linz, Austria, within the framework of a finite element simulation and investigated the resulting moisture fields and crack patterns. For this purpose, expansions and linear-elastic stresses were simulated by using the thermal and moisture fields obtained in the first simulation step and expansion coefficients. Using a multisurface failure criterion, two critical points in time were determined for each cross section, at which advanced crack simulations were carried out using the extended finite element method. The resulting crack lengths showed that the Eurocode5 assumption of a linear relationship between crack-free and total width could be verified for both drying and wetting cases.In future, the obtained crack patterns might also be used to investigate the actual reduction of load-bearing capacities of such cross sections, since the position of a crack and, for example, the maximum shear stress may not coincide. For the first time in this work, a consistent concept is presented to estimate the resulting crack formation in a wooden element from any moisture load based on a mechanical well-founded simulation concept. For this reason, this work is intended to lay a basis for a more accurate consideration of climate-related loads on wooden elements up to timber constructions.

Exploitation of local and global information in predictive processing

While prediction errors have been established to instigate learning through model adaptation, recent studies have stressed the role of model-compliant events in predictive processing. Specifically, probabilistic information at critical points in time (so-called checkpoints) has been suggested to be sampled in order to evaluate the internal model, particularly in uncertain contexts. This way, initial model-based expectations are iteratively reaffirmed under uncertainty, even in the absence of prediction errors. Using electroencephalography (EEG), the present study aimed to investigate the interplay of such global uncertainty information and local adjustment cues prompting on-line adjustments of expectations. Within a stream of single digits, participants were to detect ordered sequences (i.e., 3-4-5-6-7) that had a regular length of five digits and were occasionally extended to seven digits. Over time, these extensions were either rare (low irreducible uncertainty) or frequent (high uncertainty) and could be unexpected or indicated by incidental colour cues. Accounting for cue information, an N400 component was revealed as the correlate of locally unexpected (vs expected) outcomes, reflecting effortful integration of incongruous information. As for model-compliant information, multivariate pattern decoding within the P3b time frame demonstrated effective exploitation of local (adjustment cues vs non-informative analogues) and global information (high vs low uncertainty regular endings) sampled from probabilistic events. Finally, superior fit of a global model (disregarding local adjustments) compared to a local model (including local adjustments) in a representational similarity analysis underscored the precedence of global reference frames in hierarchical predictive processing. Overall, results suggest that just like error-induced model adaptation, model evaluation is not limited to either local or global information. Following the hierarchical organisation of predictive processing, model evaluation too can occur at several levels of the processing hierarchy.

Research in the Field of Down Syndrome: Impact, Continuing Need, and Possible Risks from the New Eugenics

AbstractResearch in the field of Down syndrome is under threat. There are two issues behind this threat: first availability of research funding could be limited by the perception that Down syndrome has become a rare condition. The second is that some believe the important work on Down syndrome is complete. In this commentary, the implications of the “new eugenics” on Down syndrome research are discussed, through reflecting on the impact of research arising from the 40 year Down Syndrome Research Program at The University of Queensland and other studies. This body of research has led to remarkable improvements in the quality of life of individuals with Down syndrome and those around them. The current context, particularly in the time of widespread availability of prenatal screening, gives a renewed imperative for research to improve the broader understanding of disability in the community enabling informed decisions at critical points in time. There are at least two potential benefits for continuing research on Down syndrome: for the individual and family; and for society in general. When a baby with Down syndrome is conceived, what might have been viewed as a tragedy may be seen very differently by those with lived experience. Understanding that lived experience and sharing the findings is the work of researchers in the field of Down syndrome, and there is much more work to be done.

Enabling Efficient and Sustainable Transitions of Water Distribution Systems under Network Structure Uncertainty

This paper focuses on the performance of water distribution systems (WDSs) during long-term city transitions. A transition describes the pathway from an initial to a final planning stage including the structural and functional changes on the infrastructure over time. A methodology is presented where consecutive WDSs under changing conditions are automatically created, simulated and then analyzed at specific points in time during a transition process of several decades. Consequential WDS analyses include (a) uncertain network structure, (b) temporal and spatial demand variation and (c) network displacement. With the proposed approach, it is possible to identify robust WDS structures and critical points in time for which sufficient hydraulic and water quality requirements cannot be ensured to the customers. The approach is applied to a case study, where a WDS transition of epic dimensions is currently taking place due to a city relocation. The resulting necessity of its WDS transition is modelled with automatically created planning options for consecutive years of the transition process. For the investigated case study, we tested a traditional “doing-all-at-the-end” approach, where necessary pipe upgrades are performed at the last stages of the transition process. Results show that the sole design of the desired final-stage WDS is insufficient. Owing to the drastic network deconstruction and the stepwise “loss of capacity”, critical pipes must be redesigned at earlier stages to maintain acceptable service levels for most of the investigated future scenarios.

Effect of the Various Steps in the Processing of Human Milk in the Concentrations of IgA, IgM, and Lactoferrin.

Human milk immune components are unique and important for the development of the newborn. Milk processing at the Human Milk Banks (HMB), however, causes partial destruction of immune proteins. The objective of this study was to determine the effects that heating during the milk processing procedure at the HMB had on the concentrations of IgA, IgM, and lactoferrin at three critical points in time. Fifty milk samples (150 mL) were collected from voluntary donors at the HMB at the Hospital Nacional Pedro de Bethancourt, located in Antigua Guatemala. Samples from three critical points in time during the milk processing procedure were selected for analysis: freezing/thawing I, freezing/thawing II, and pasteurization. IgA, IgM, and lactoferrin concentrations were determined during each critical point and compared with a baseline concentration. After milk processing, IgA, IgM, and lactoferrin mean concentrations were reduced by 30.0%, 36.0%, and 70.0%, respectively (p < 0.001). Reduction of biological activity was mainly attributed to pasteurization for IgA and lactoferrin (p < 0.001); the first freezing/thawing processes before pasteurization showed no significant reduction difference between mean concentrations of IgA (p = 0.160) and lactoferrin (p = 0.345) but showed a significant effect on IgM concentration (p = 0.016), and the second freezing/thawing procedure only showed a significant effect on IgA (p < 0.001). The effects of milk processing on the immune proteins that were evaluated in this study demonstrated a significant reduction.

Planning to deliberate thoroughly: If-then planned deliberation increases the adjustment of decisions to newly available information

Planning our actions in advance is an important means of action control and increases the likelihood of initiating intended actions at critical points in time (Gollwitzer, 1999; Gollwitzer & Oettingen, 2016). In the current research, we investigate whether planning to deliberate thoroughly can also increase the likelihood of deliberation when it is needed. As an increase in deliberation is often associated with more thorough use of available information, we predict that planning to deliberate causes people to adjust their current course of action more closely to newly available information. We test this prediction in three experiments in which the participants are faced with the decision to continue with or disengage from a chosen course of action after new information has become available. The first experiment uses an established escalation of commitment paradigm (Study 1); the second and third experiment use a more naturalistic task based on the card game of poker (Studies 2 & 3). In all three studies, planning to deliberate at a critical point in time by forming implementation intentions reduced the tendency to stick to a failing course of action, suggesting that plans to deliberate can be used to increase the likelihood of deliberation and thereby the effective processing of newly available information.

Mulki Al-Sharmani (ed.): Feminist activism, women’s rights and legal reform

As a set of historically, socially and institutionally specific statements, terms, categories and beliefs, discourse is the site where meanings are contested and power relations determined. It is the ability to see how knowledge, meaning and action are controlled through official institutions and in social relations that can illuminate the exercise of power in society (Marchand and Parpart 1995, 3). Because concepts such as feminist activism, legal reform and women’s empowerment are complex and multifaceted, they need to be understood and seen as part of the complex social relations in which they exist together with the power relations and interests embodied within those relations. The way that power produces knowledge and how different interpretations occupy a space at any one time are both critical to understanding the formation of legal discourse; providing the basis for an endless opposition between legitimacy and illegitimacy, struggle and submission. With this in mind, ‘Feminist Activism, Women’s Rights and Legal Reform’ is a timely collection, which brings together case studies of feminist struggles around the recognition, definition and implementation of reforms under the broad remit of ‘family law’. Each case study reflects upon the feminist struggle for legal reform at critical points in time within particular but culturally diverse socio-political contexts, including Palestine, Egypt, Yemen, Bangladesh, Iran, Morocco, Brazil and Ghana. The examples not only examine the content of the changes being advocated but also critique and analyse the choices and strategies employed by feminist activists, in addition to the subsequent gains and shortfalls achieved as a result. In this sense, the book not only provides insight into the commonly contested issues relating to family law around the world, such as age of marriage, polygamy, duty to

Constructing personalized longitudinal holo'omes of colon cancer-prone humans and their modeling in flies and mice.

Specific host genes and intestinal microbes, dysbiosis, aberrant immune responses and lifestyle may contribute to intestinal inflammation and cancer, but each of these parameters does not suffice to explain why sporadic colon cancer develops at an old age and only in some of the people with the same profile. To improve our understanding, longitudinal multi-omic and personalized studies will help to pinpoint combinations of host genetic, epigenetic, microbiota and lifestyle-shaped factors, such as blood factors and metabolites that change as we age. The intestinal holo’ome – defined as the combination of host and microbiota genomes, transcriptomes, proteomes, and metabolomes – may be imbalanced and shift to disease when the wrong host gene expression profile meets the wrong microbiota composition. These imbalances can be triggered by the dietary- or lifestyle-shaped intestinal environment. Accordingly, personalized human intestinal holo’omes will differ significantly among individuals and between two critical points in time: long before and upon the onset of disease. Detrimental combinations of factors could therefore be pinpointed computationally and validated using animal models, such as mice and flies. Finally, treatment strategies that break these harmful combinations could be tested in clinical trials. Herein we provide an overview of the literature and a roadmap to this end.

Promoting Handwashing Behavior: The Effects of Large‐scale Community and School‐level Interventions

This paper analyzes a randomized experiment that uses novel strategies to promote handwashing with soap at critical points in time in Peru. It evaluates a large-scale comprehensive initiative that involved both community and school activities in addition to communication campaigns. The analysis indicates that the initiative was successful in reaching the target audience and in increasing the treated population's knowledge about appropriate handwashing behavior. These improvements translated into higher self-reported and observed handwashing with soap at critical junctures. However, no significant improvements in the health of children under the age of 5years were observed. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Financial Incentives and Salesperson Time Orientation in New Product Launch: A Longitudinal Study

The success of a new product launch critically depends on an engaged and dedicated sales force. Salespeople who are involved in a new product launch must overcome significant uncertainty associated with the new product's performance, which can affect success expectations and, in turn, sales effort for the new product. Moreover, success expectations may drop in the first few months of the launch period, due to initial negative market feedback or general decline in sales force enthusiasm. Diminished expectations may start a vicious circle effect where lower success expectations for the new product lead to lower sales effort that, in turn, leads to lower performance, which further lowers expectations, and so on. Based on insights from attribution-expectancy theory, this study investigates two distinct mechanisms to counteract the potential downward spiral in success expectations and sales effort devoted to a new product. Specifically, this research examines the role of financial incentives and salespersons' long-term orientation in creating and maintaining high new product success expectations and sales effort during a new product launch. To investigate how the effect of these factors changes over time, success expectations and sales effort are examined across two critical points in time: the start of a new product launch and at completion of the first sales cycle. To test the model empirically, the North American sales force (n = 129) of a business unit of a global firm is surveyed longitudinally during the launch of a new line of industrial products. The data are analyzed using a partial least squares model. The results show that initial success expectations have a significant effect on sales effort later in the launch, and that this relationship is mediated by success expectations later in the launch. Success expectations and sales effort early in the launch are also shown to impact the perceived attractiveness of the financial incentives offered, but this does not translate into higher success expectations or sales effort at the end of the launch. In contrast, the long-term orientation of salespersons is key to maintaining higher success expectations and sales effort at the end of the launch.

Promoting Handwashing Behavior: The Effect of Large-Scale Community and School-Level Interventions

Washing one’s hands with soap at critical points in time is a simple practice that helps to prevent serious infectious diseases. However, less than a third of the population in the developing world does it on a routine basis. The main economic question that this observation poses is how this behavior can be promoted in a cost-effective way. This paper analyzes a randomized experiment that uses novel strategies to promote handwashing with soap at critical points in time in Peru. It evaluates a large-scale comprehensive initiative which involved both community and school activities in addition to communication campaigns. The analysis indicates that the initiative was successful in reaching the target audience and in increasing the treated population’s knowledge about appropriate handwashing behavior. These improvements translated into higher self-reported and observed handwashing with soap at critical junctures. However, no significant improvements in the health of children under the age of 5 were observed. The results go one step further than the assessments of other promotion campaigns that have been based solely on mass-media, but they also suggest that changing behavior in any substantive way that will improve people’s health status is a complex task that requires intensive and more personalized interventions. This conclusion is in line with earlier contributions to the literature on the topic.

Bifurcation of Critical Points for Solutions of the 2D Euler and 2D Quasi-geostrophic Equations

We consider the 2D Euler and 2D quasi-geostrophic equations with periodic boundary conditions. For both systems we will use the stream-function formulation and study the bifurcation problem for the critical points of the stream function. In a small neighborhood of the origin, we construct a set of initial data such that initial critical points of the stream function bifurcate from 1 to 2 and then to 3 critical points in finite time. For the quasi-geostrophic equation the whole bifurcation process takes place strictly within the lifespan of the constructed local solution.

Bifurcations of solutions for the Boussinesq system in [formula omitted

In this paper, we study the real analytic regularity and bifurcations of the solutions for the two-dimensional periodic Boussinesq system. If the critical points of the stream function ψ are points of maxima or minima, one shall call these points viscous vortices because near these points the velocity u is tangent to the level sets of ψ which is a closed curve. For any smooth initial temperature θ0, we can construct a set of initial stream functions such that initial critical points bifurcate from 1 to 2 and then to 3 critical points in finite time. The bifurcation takes place in a small neighborhood of the origin. For another set of initial stream functions, we show that 3 critical points merge into 1 critical point in finite time. We also construct a set of initial stream functions so that bifurcation can be generated without the existence of an initial critical point.

Nonsymmetric bifurcations of solutions of the 2D Navier–Stokes system

We consider the 2D Navier–Stokes system written for the stream function with periodic boundary conditions and construct a set of initial data such that initial critical points bifurcate from 1 to 2 and then to 3 critical points in finite time. The bifurcation takes place in a small neighborhood of the origin. Our construction does not require any symmetry assumptions or the existence of special fixed points. For another set of initial data we show that 3 critical points merge into 1 critical point in finite time. We also construct a set of initial data so that bifurcation can be generated by the Navier–Stokes flow and do not require the existence of an initial critical point.

Situational interest and academic achievement in the active-learning classroom

The aim of the present study was to investigate how situational interest develops over time and how it is related to academic achievement in an active-learning classroom. Five measures of situational interest were administered at critical points in time to 69 polytechnic students during a one-day, problem-based learning session. Results revealed that situational interest significantly increased after the problem stimulus was presented. Subsequently, situational interest gradually decreased but at the end of the day increased again. Testing a path model relating the situational interest measures showed strong (directional) interrelations. Moreover, situational interest was highly predictive for observed achievement-related classroom behaviors. The latter, in turn, proved to be a significant predictor of academic achievement. Aggregating situational interest over the day led to less accurate predictions of achievement-related classroom behaviors and academic achievement. Implications of these findings for situational interest research are discussed.

Learning by doing: The objectification of knowledge across semiotic modalities in middle school chemistry lab activities

This analysis follows students’ action and interaction with a single scientific phenomenon (bubbling/gas) over the course of a curriculum unit in a middle school science classroom to examine how and what they learn when doing laboratory activities. Taking a situated approach to interaction, I place the process of objectification in its multimodal context, focusing specifically on perceptual and linguistic objectification to highlight the importance of action, bodily movement, and the use of materials in students’ developing understanding of the law of conservation of matter. These two processes of objectification show how students orient themselves to the scientific materials at critical points in time, and how they transform first-hand activity into meaningful linguistic representations to demonstrate they have learned from their activities, and to create forms of knowledge that can be decontextualized and recontextualized in future learning situations.

Mortality from external causes in Lithuania: looking for critical points in time and place

A study was undertaken to analyse trends in mortality from major external causes of death, and to detect urban/rural differences by cut points over the period of socioeconomic transition. Information on deaths from major external causes (traffic accidents, suicides, and homicides) for the 1990-2000 period was obtained from Lithuanian Department of Statistics. Mortality rates were age standardized, using the European standard, and analysed, according to (urban/rural) residence and sex. The Jointpoint analysis was used to identify the best-fitting points, wherever a statistically significant change in mortality occurred. The most critical point for external causes of mortality during the period of transition was the year 1994, when an increasing mortality trend reversed to a decreasing one. Mortality from suicides primarily caused these positive changes. Changes in mortality from traffic accidents were not significantly associated with the period under analysis. Numerous less favourable trends in rural areas, including suicide rates, traffic accidents, and homicides, are likely to stratify urban/rural health outcomes in the future. Despite a recent decline, mortality from external causes remains at an extremely high level in Lithuania. Future progress requires sustained improvements in prevention, and serious attention to external causes of death in health policy development.