Action Intentions Research Articles

Exploration of the Application and Practice of Digital Twin Technology in Teaching Driven by Smart City Construction

Traditional engineering education cannot effectively respond to the demand for talents in the construction of smart cities. The application of digital twin technology in education is mostly based on case studies and lacks empirical tests. This study takes the practical teaching of a project-based course on smart city parks as an example to explore the action intention of graduate students to use digital twin technology consistently, and to provide a theoretical basis and teaching practice guidance to promote the rational application of digital twin technology in engineering education. This study set up a quasi-experimental design through the digital twin learning system, grouping 24 graduate students with 4 faculty members. The experimental group is digital twin-assisted practical teaching, and the control group is traditional teaching method, the experimental cycle is 12 weeks, and the total lesson time is 24 h. Secondly, combined with UTAUT2 model and TTF theory, the variable factor hypothesis was adopted as the scale design means, and the experimental validity was improved through questionnaire data analysis. Meanwhile, the influencing factors in the use of digital twin platform were recorded in detail through the process of data collection, data processing and modeling, as well as the application practice of digital twin platform. Finally, the results of the comprehensive survey data show that the graduate students in the experimental group are significantly better than the control group in terms of self-confidence, skill enhancement, learning outcomes, and learning experience. All these results provide information for course teaching practice, training professional teaching teams, optimizing innovative teaching paths, and promoting the cultivation and delivery of smart city technology talents.

From imagination to activism: Cognitive alternatives motivate commitment to activism through identification with social movements and collective efficacy.

Having a vision and being able to imagine socially and ecologically just alternatives can motivate people for societal transformation. However, which psychological processes drive this link between the mental accessibility of societal alternatives and collective action? We hypothesized that collective efficacy beliefs and politicized identification form two pathways mediating the effects of cognitive alternatives on high-cost activist behaviour. Two studies and a pooled analysis tested these hypotheses longitudinally. Data were collected in two field settings: a climate camp and an online conference on socio-ecological visions. In line with our assumptions, and across three of the four analysed timeframes, latent change score modelling showed that changes in cognitive alternatives predicted changes in collective efficacy beliefs and social movement identification, which in turn, predicted changes in collective action intentions. We found clear evidence for our hypotheses in the short term and mixed evidence in the long term. Additional analyses including participative efficacy showed no relevant effects. We concluded that the ability to envision social change may foster a sense of agency as members of social movements. These processes linking imagination to activism are less about individual efficacy than about realizing the collective possibilities for change and identifying with the groups enacting it.

Citizen science promotes knowledge, skills and collective action to monitor and protect freshwater streams

Abstract Citizen science has great potential to foster ecological knowledge, skills and collective action for biodiversity conservation. To date, however, there are few experimental studies of behaviour change outcomes induced by citizen science. We assessed the effects of citizen science in ecological stream monitoring on participants' individual and collective behaviour and action intentions to protect streams beyond the immediate scope of the citizen science project. For this we applied a three‐wave, quasi‐experimental survey design with a citizen science treatment group (N = 213 participants of the project FLOW in Germany) and two control groups (waiting control group: N = 92, panel control group: N = 250). In addition, we analysed citizen science effects on potential predictors of freshwater conservation behaviour, such as knowledge, skills, awareness of stream stressors and group identification. Results of linear mixed‐model analysis showed that, compared to the control groups, citizen scientists significantly increased their objective stream‐related knowledge, their self‐reported stream monitoring skills and their awareness of stream stressors. These changes remained stable 6 weeks after the citizen science intervention. Notably, citizen scientists also reported increased identification with their citizen science project group and higher levels of collective and personal behaviour to protect streams at posttest (e.g. contacting local politicians with ideas for stream protection or using biodegradable detergents). Analysis revealed that increases in group identification and collective stream protection behaviour were significantly correlated. We could show that the citizen science intervention was particularly effective for participants with high intrinsic motivation and for those with low prior knowledge and experience in stream monitoring. Synthesis and applications. Citizen science can serve as a useful tool to promote ecological understanding, awareness and collective action to conserve freshwater streams. By fostering volunteer skills and community building, citizen science projects can empower participants with different levels of experience to engage in freshwater monitoring and protection. Decision makers should actively support approaches for citizen participation in freshwater monitoring, recognising that collective engagement of diverse community members is needed to finally meet the European Water Framework Directive's goal of restoring the good ecological status of freshwater ecosystems. Read the free Plain Language Summary for this article on the Journal blog.

Exploring Secondary Transfer Generalisation Effects From Black and Gay Contact: The Role of Humanisation

ABSTRACTIntergroup contact is considered one of the most effective ways to reduce prejudice. An extension of contact theory, the secondary transfer effect (STE), stipulates that contact with a primary outgroup can impact attitudes toward a second, uninvolved outgroup. Here, we test the direct and indirect effects of contact with the primary outgroup on attitudes toward the secondary outgroup through outgroup humanisation, assessing White, heterosexual Americans' contact with both Black and gay people (N = 471; 52.7% men; Mage = 44.90, SD = 14.75). Path analyses were conducted on four fully saturated models that included intergroup contact (quantity, quality), humanisation of each group, and intergroup outcomes (attitudes, collective action intentions). Direct generalisation consistently occurred from gay contact (quantity or quality) to Black attitudes or Black collective action. Only one indirect generalisation pathway consistently occurred: a greater quantity of gay contact humanised Black people, which itself was associated with more positive attitudes and stronger collective action intentions toward Black people. However, the converse generalisation was not found: Black contact was rarely associated with direct or indirect intergroup outcomes toward gay people. The present study is the first to find indirect humanisation pathways for the STE, but from gay‐to‐Black contact only. Implications for future research are discussed. Please refer to the Supplementary Material section to find this article's Community and Social Impact Statement.

Expert and Novice Teachers' Cognitive Neural Differences in Understanding Students' Classroom Action Intentions.

Teachers' intention understanding ability reflects their professional insight, which is the basis for effective classroom teaching activities. However, the cognitive process and brain mechanism of how teachers understand students' action intention in class are still unclear. This study used event-related potential (ERP) technology to explore the cognitive neural differences in intention understanding ability among teachers with different levels of knowledge and experience. The experiment used the comic strips paradigm to examine the ability of expert and novice teachers to understand students' normative and non-normative classroom actions under different text prompts ("how" and "why"). The results revealed that in the late time window, expert teachers induced larger P300 and LPC amplitudes when they understood students' classroom action intentions, while the N250 amplitudes induced by novice teachers in the early time window were significantly larger. In addition, for both types of teachers, when understanding the intentions behind students' normative actions, the N250 amplitude was the most significant, while the P300 and LPC amplitudes were more significant for non-normative actions. This study found that teachers at varying professional development stages had different time processing processes in intention understanding ability, which supported teachers' brain electrophysiological activities related to social ability.

The concepts of sustainability value and the application of big data in enhancing the ability of sustainability marketing

PurposeWe seek to contribute to the literature by comparing and analyzing the relationship between Australian and Taiwanese students regarding environmental value attitude, action intention and green marketing intention. Specifically, by comparing the green marketing intention of hospitality and tourism (H&T) students in the East with that in the West.Design/methodology/approachA well-designed curriculum examines student thinking and behavior (learn). This study compares and analyzes the value and attitude and the application of big data to green marketing among Taiwanese and Australian university students using the stimulus-organism-response (S-O-R) model. Structural equation modeling (SEM) was used to test the hypotheses in a sample of 633 H&T students in Taiwan (389) and Australia (244).FindingsThis study also shows how the national differences between Australia and Taiwan have interference effects on the relationship between value attitudes and action intentions and between action intentions and the green marketing intention. We also combined the application of big data and related variables and estimated the mediating effect of related variables to evaluate the impact on action intentions and green marketing of big data applications.Practical implicationsThere are significant differences in the sustainable behavior and intentions of H&T higher education students that reflect the educational differences between the East and the West. These different results may be due to a lack of natural resources and the relatively smaller size of Taiwan. With the strengthening of environmental action intention (AI) and green marketing intention (GMI), Taiwanese hospitality and management (H&M) students' sense of crisis increases, and their performance in GMI is slightly higher than that in Australia.Originality/valueThese findings indicate that it is necessary to consider students' ecological concepts, environmental knowledge, environmental value attitude and environmental action intention to improve their intentions to engage in green marketing under the stimulus-organism-response (S-O-R) framework. We also found that environmental knowledge has a mediating effect on the relationship between ecological concepts and environmental value attitude.

From roadblocks to property damage: How injustice perceptions and trust in authorities are associated with participation in nonnormative climate protest

AbstractThe climate crisis calls for radical action, but what drives people to engage in climate protest? We recruited respondents during protests of Extinction Rebellion in the Netherlands and examined how intentions to engage in normative action (e.g., protest march), moderate nonnormative action (e.g., roadblock), and openness to more extreme nonnormative action (e.g., property damage) related to perceived injustice and trust in authorities. Study 1 found that perceived injustice was linked to all action intentions, while trust was only negatively associated with nonnormative protest. Study 2 revealed that nonnormative protest was specifically related to lower trust in democracy, judges, and the police. Furthermore, moderate action intentions were related to various injustice perceptions, whereas extreme actions were exclusively linked to social injustice.

Sustainable Development Revisited: Rethinking Growth-Centric Paradigms Through the Lens of the Sabbath

This paper argues that the current growth-centric paradigm of sustainable development is fundamentally flawed and proposes a paradigm shift towards the biblical concept of the Sabbath. It critiques the internal contradictions of the SDGs and challenges the unsustainable pursuit of infinite growth in addressing social and ecological crises. By exploring Sabbath's principles of rest, recalibration, and redistribution, the paper offers an ethical foundation for self-limitation and a basis for human identity beyond productivity—addressing the shortcomings of the degrowth movement. It proposes practical applications of Sabbath principles at individual, community, and structural levels, drawing upon empirical examples to demonstrate their potential as pathways to environmental justice. These multi-level applications aim to bridge the gap between the intentions of international agreements and impactful local action. The paper concludes that Sabbath presents a transformative vision for sustainable development and environmental justice, fostering a harmonious relationship between humanity and the planet. Keywords: Sustainability, Development, Sabbath, Degrowth, Capitalism, Environmental Justice, Poverty, Well-being, Ethics, Religion.

Measuring Collective Action Intention Toward Gender Equality Across Cultures

Measuring Collective Action Intention Toward Gender Equality Across Cultures

The association between mass media news about interethnic contact and relations between ethnic minorities and natives: The perspective of African immigrants in Italy.

The present research investigated the role of a pervasive and often negative form of indirect contact, exposure to mass media news on interethnic contact. Specifically, we examined the associations between mass media exposure and both African immigrants' attitudes toward native Italians and their collective action intentions to achieve higher intergroup equality in the host country. We conducted two survey studies, one cross-sectional (Study 1, N = 285) and the second longitudinal (Study 2, N = 423) with African immigrants living in Italy. Exposure to negative mass media news was linked to less positive attitudes toward native Italians and more collective action of African immigrants. The negative link between negative mass media news exposure and intergroup attitudes was stronger for those African migrants who reported relatively low positive and negative direct intergroup contact. These findings were consistent across both studies. The positive link between negative mass media news exposure and collective action was stronger among African immigrants with relatively low negative direct intergroup contact. The evidence illustrates the independent and combined ways in which the valence of direct and indirect contact can affect immigrants' attitudes toward natives, and their motivation to build a more inclusive and equal society. Overall, results highlighted the greater strength of negative rather than positive indirect contact of immigrants, especially when they reported less positive direct contact experience with native Italians. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2024 APA, all rights reserved).

Action expectancy modulates activity in the mirror neuron system and mentalizing system

Action understanding involves two distinct processing levels that engage separate neural mechanisms: perception of concrete kinematic information and recognition of abstract action intentions. The mirror neuron system and the mentalizing system have both been linked to concrete action and abstract information processing, but their specific roles remain debatable. Here, we conducted a functional magnetic resonance imaging study with 26 participants who passively observed expected and unexpected actions. We performed whole-brain activation, region of interest, and effective connectivity analyses to investigate the neural correlates of these actions. Whole-brain activation analyses revealed that expected actions were associated with increased activation in the left medial superior frontal gyrus, while unexpected actions were linked to heightened activity in the left supramarginal gyrus, left superior parietal lobule, right inferior temporal gyrus, and left middle frontal gyrus. Region of interest analyses demonstrated that the left ventral premotor cortex exhibited greater activation during the observation of expected actions compared to unexpected actions, while the left inferior frontal gyrus, left superior parietal lobule, and left precuneus showed stronger activation during the observation of unexpected actions. Effective connectivity was observed between the left ventral premotor cortex and the left angular gyrus, left intraparietal sulcus, left dorsal premotor cortex, and left ventromedial prefrontal cortex with the middle frontal gyrus when observing unexpected, but not expected, actions. These findings suggest that expected actions are primarily processed by the mirror neuron system, whereas unexpected actions engage both the mirror neuron system and the mentalizing system, with these systems playing complementary roles in the understanding of unexpected actions.

Online Contacts Supported with Recategorization Strategies: Do They Affect Outgroup Attitudes and Collective Action Intentions?

Studies on face-to-face intergroup contact demonstrate varied effects for members of advantaged and disadvantaged groups on harmonious relations and collective action intentions. This study extends the literature by examining to what extent those effects exist when the contact is online and also by examining which recategorization strategy would be more effective in producing positive outcomes for those groups. For this aim, students of the two universities—CU and ATU (higher and lower status, respectively)—in Adana, Turkey were made to contact in small groups on a text-based online platform. Participants were distributed into four-people groups—either mixed of ATU and CU students or ATU students only. Either a common ingroup identity or dual identities were made salient in the mixed groups, whereas the individual identity was made salient in the groups consisting of ATU students only. Data were collected at three time periods: Two weeks before (368 participants), immediately after (159 participants), and one month after the contact (138 participants). Concerning outgroup attitudes, irrespective of salient identities, mixed groups improved attitudes, sustained in follow-up. Regarding collective action intentions, CU students’ intentions increased (T1 to T3), while for ATU students in all groups, intentions decreased-whether cross-group contact was experienced or not.

Human in the collaborative loop: a strategy for integrating human activity recognition and non-invasive brain-machine interfaces to control collaborative robots.

Human activity recognition (HAR) and brain-machine interface (BMI) are two emerging technologies that can enhance human-robot collaboration (HRC) in domains such as industry or healthcare. HAR uses sensors or cameras to capture and analyze the movements and actions of humans, while BMI uses human brain signals to decode action intentions. Both technologies face challenges impacting accuracy, reliability, and usability. In this article, we review the state-of-the-art techniques and methods for HAR and BMI and highlight their strengths and limitations. We then propose a hybrid framework that fuses HAR and BMI data, which can integrate the complementary information from the brain and body motion signals and improve the performance of human state decoding. We also discuss our hybrid method's potential benefits and implications for HRC.

Force reflections of auditory and tactile action-effect weighting in motor planning

Most voluntary actions have only few goals, which provides considerable freedom in the selection of action parameters. Recent studies showed that task-irrelevant aspects of the task context influence the motor parameters of the actions in a way which seems to reflect the relative importance of these aspects within the underlying action representation. The present study investigated how the intensity of auditory action-effects affected force exertion patterns in a self-paced action production task. Participants applied force impulses with their index finger on a force-sensitive resistor every three seconds. In four separate conditions, force impulses elicited no sound, or elicited tones with 69, 59 or 49 dB intensity. The results showed that participants applied more force when tone intensity was lower, and when tones were absent. These force differences were also present in the first 60 ms following tone onset, implying that these reflected differences in motor planning. The results are compatible with the notion that actions are represented in terms of their sensory effects, which are weighted differently—presumably to maintain an optimal level of overall auditory and tactile stimulation in the present case. These results hint at the potential usefulness of motor parameters as readouts of action intentions.

The role of emotions in collective responses to in-group norm violations: the case of university’s sensitivity to the natural environment norm

The primary objective of this study was to examine the influence of perceptions of environmental in-group norm violations and the associated emotions on the level of support for environmental social movements. Particularly, we examined the association between collective action intentions and the emotions of anger, disgust, guilt, and pride elicited in response to the violation of in-group pro-environmental norms. There were 221 undergraduate participants (154 females, 62 males, 5 non-binary) studying at a Turkish state university, where preserving on-campus environment is perceived as the norm. Participants were randomly assigned to one of two experimental conditions in which on-campus environmental norms were violated or adopted by their peers (i.e., in-group members). Then, their perceptions of norm-violation, emotions about their peers’ on-campus environmental behaviors, and collective action intentions in improving campus’s environmental circumstances were measured. We used structural equation modeling to test the hypothesized links between the study variables. Our findings revealed that participants exhibited high levels of norm violation anger, guilt, and disgust and low levels of pride when their peers were presented as polluters. Only anger and pride were found to be influential in motivating intentions for collective actions. Norm violation perception by itself was not instrumental in mobilizing individuals for the sake of the environment. When coupled with feelings of anger and pride, its association with endorsing intentions for environmental collective action became significant. The current findings shed light on the emotions associated with norm violation and their potential to foster pro-environmental collective action.

An Understanding of the Entrepreneurial Growth Intention for Creative Industries in Indonesia

Micro-small and medium enterprises (MSMEs) have a strategic role in the Indonesian economy, where MSME actors dominate the national economic actors more than 99%. Despite the large number of MSMEs in Indonesia, these MSMEs have not shown good performance. Not all MSMEs want to grow and develop. Therefore, this study aims to understand the entrepreneurial growth intention of MSMEs actors in Indonesia’s creative industries. The variables used to understand the determinants of growth intentions are personal character, knowledge, skills, motivation, gender, and education. This study used a questionnaire that was distributed to 680 respondents of MSME in the creative industry. Respondents were selected by purposive random sampling with some criteria in three provinces in Indonesia (South Sumatra, West Java, and DI Yogyakarta). The data were analyzed using a structural equation model (SEM). The results show that personal character, skills, and motivation have a significant and positive relationship with growth intentions. Motivation has the greatest influence on business growth intentions. Therefore, training related to increasing motivation, personal character, and skills is specifically needed to increase business growth intentions for MSMEs in Indonesia, especially in the creative industry sector. Keywords: growth intention, motivation, personal character, SEM, skill

Yes, we can (but for different reasons): Collective narcissism is linked to different values but similar pro-ingroup collective action tendencies among disadvantaged and advantaged ethnic groups.

Collective narcissism, a belief that one's group is exceptional and entitled to special treatment but underappreciated by others, is related to important social and political outcomes but has been predominantly studied in advantaged groups. The present research compares the motivational correlates (through values) of collective narcissism in ethnic groups of different status (advantaged and disadvantaged) and explores its associations with attitudes towards, and intention to engage in collective action. Three studies examined these processes in different national and intergroup contexts (total N = 16,275). Overall, ethnic collective narcissism was linked to self-protective values (power, and less consistently, conservation) in advantaged groups but to universalism in disadvantaged groups. Moreover, in both advantaged and disadvantaged groups, ethnic collective narcissism was related to more positive attitudes towards, and intentions of pro-ingroup actions but not to attitudes towards (other) disadvantaged groups (i.e., intergroup solidarity). These studies suggest that collective narcissism may be associated with different motivations, yet linked to similar intergroup attitudes among advantaged and disadvantaged groups.

The role of emotions in climate change communication: Examining the effects of strategy and issue framing on emotional responses and online climate action intentions

The way in which climate change-related information is framed can influence not only cognitive outcomes but also emotional responses. This web-based experiment (n = 331) investigated the effects of strategy framing and issue framing on emotions and online climate action intentions in the context of climate relationship between China and the United States. Results indicated that strategy framing increased negative emotions (i.e., anxiety and anger), whereas issue framing triggered more positive emotions (i.e., pride and excitement). No significant difference was observed regarding climate action intentions between two groups. Additionally, anxiety and anger mediated the effects of message framing on online climate action intentions. Habitual worry about climate change and attitude toward China-U.S. climate collaboration moderated the effects of strategy framing and issue framing on discrete emotions. The findings offer theoretical insights regarding emotional responses to strategy framing and practical implications on climate communication.

Competitive (but not cooperative) body odors bias the discrimination of action intentions towards cooperation

Odors help us to interpret the environment, including the nature of social interactions. But, whether and how they influence the ability to discriminate the intentional states embedded in actions is unclear. In two experiments, we asked two independent groups of participants to discriminate motor intentions from videos showing one agent performing a reach-to-grasp movement with another agent with a cooperative or a competitive intent, and the same movement performed alone at either natural- or fast-speed, as controls. Task-irrelevant odor primes preceded each video presentation. Experiment 1 (N = 19) included masked cooperative and competitive body odors (human sweat collected while the donors were engaged in cooperative and competitive activities), whereas Experiment 2 (N = 20) included a common odor (cedarwood oil) and no odor (clean air) as primes. In an odor-primed, two-alternative forced choice task, participants discriminated the intention underlying the observed action. The results indicated that the odor exposure modulated the discrimination speed across different intentions, but only when the action intentions were hard to discriminate (cooperative vs. individual natural-speed, and competitive vs. individual fast-speed). Contrary to our hypothesis, a direct odor-action intention compatibility effect was not found. Instead, we propose a negative arousal compatibility-like effect to explain our results. Discrimination of high arousing action intentions (i.e., competitive) took longer when primed by high arousing odors (common odor and competitive body odor) than by low arousing odors (cooperative body odor and no odor). Discrimination of low arousing action intentions (i.e., cooperative) took longer when primed by low arousing odors than by high arousing odors. All in all, competitive (but not cooperative) body odors bias the discrimination of action intentions towards cooperation.

Motivating parents to protect their children from wildfire smoke: the impact of air quality index infographics

Background. Wildfire smoke events are increasing in frequency and intensity due to climate change. Children are especially vulnerable to health effects even at moderate smoke levels. However, it is unclear how parents respond to Air Quality Indices (AQIs) frequently used by agencies to communicate air pollution health risks. Methods. In an experiment (3 × 2 × 2 factorial design), 2,100 parents were randomly assigned to view one of twelve adapted AQI infographics that varied by visual (table, line, gauge), index type (AQI [0-500], AQHI [1-11+]), and risk level (moderate, high). Participants were told to imagine encountering the infographic in a short-term exposure scenario. They reported worry about wildfire smoke, intentions to take risk-mitigating actions (e.g., air purifier use), and support for various exposure reduction policies. Subsequently, participants were told to imagine encountering the same infographic daily during a school week in a long-term exposure scenario and again reported worry, action intentions, and policy support. Results. Parents’ responses significantly differentiated between risk levels that both pose a threat to children’s health; worry and action intentions were much higher in the high-risk group than the moderate-risk group in both short-exposure (F = 748.68 p<.001; F = 411.59, p<.001) and long-exposure scenarios (F = 470.51, p<.001; F = 212.01, p<.001). However, in the short-exposure scenario, when shown the AQHI [1-11+] with either the line or gauge visuals, parents’ action intentions were more similar between moderate- and high-risk level groups (3-way interaction, F = 6.03, p = .002). Conclusions. These results suggest some index formats such as the AQHI—rather than the AQI—may better attune parents to moderate levels of wildfire smoke being dangerous to children’s health. Our research offers insights for agencies and officials seeking to improve current public education efforts during wildfire smoke events and speaks to the critical need to educate parents and help them act short-term and long-term to protect children’s health.