Smaller Units Of Analysis Research Articles

Urban Earthquake Vulnerability Assessment and Mapping at the Microscale Based on the Catastrophe Progression Method

Vulnerability assessment and mapping play a crucial role in disaster risk reduction and planning for adaptation to a future earthquake. Turkey is one of the most at-risk countries for earthquake disasters worldwide. Therefore, it is imperative to develop effective earthquake vulnerability assessment and mapping at practically relevant scales. In this study, a holistic earthquake vulnerability index that addresses the multidimensional nature of earthquake vulnerability was constructed. With the aim of representing the vulnerability as a continuum across space, buildings were set as the smallest unit of analysis. The study area is in İzmit City of Turkey, with the exposed human and structural elements falling inside the most hazardous zone of seismicity. The index was represented by the building vulnerability, socioeconomic vulnerability, and vulnerability of the built environment. To minimize the subjectivity and uncertainty that the vulnerability indices based on expert knowledge are suffering from, an extension of the catastrophe progression method for the objective weighing of indicators was proposed. Earthquake vulnerability index and components were mapped, a local spatial autocorrelation metric was employed where the hotspot maps demarcated the earthquake vulnerability, and the study quantitatively revealed an estimate of people at risk. With its objectivity and straightforward implementation, the method can aid decision support for disaster risk reduction and emergency management.

Going big, going small: A perspective on strategies for researching audit quality

This paper updates how archival audit research has evolved since the summary in Francis (2004) of what we knew then about audit quality. The paper describes an evolution from “going big” and asking basic questions about the audit market, institutions, and audit quality, to “going small” with a focus on smaller units of analysis (offices, partners, and engagement teams) as the key to understanding audit quality. I used to believe that audit firm differences, and differences across offices within firms, were the most important audit-related sources of variation in quality, and that differences in people and audit teams were relatively unimportant. However, the evidence in Cameran, Campa, and Francis (2022) using UK partner data convinced me otherwise. I now believe the behaviors of partner-led engagement teams are just as important (and maybe more important) than audit firms and offices in understanding audit quality. However, to learn more about partner-led teams means going inside the black box of audit firms, which requires proprietary data from audit firms and research access to their professional staff. I conclude with an example of collaborative research with audit firms.

Adopting a ‘move’ rather than a ‘marker’ approach to metadiscourse: A taxonomy for spoken student presentations

In metadiscourse work, what may be called a ‘marker’ approach vastly outnumbers a ‘move’ approach. This has led to a research focus on small units of analysis, typically word-based, classifying for example the pronoun I as Self-mention. This paper argues that we also need to develop a ‘move’ approach in metadiscourse studies, involving a more contextualised analysis of the discourse functions that speakers/writers use metadiscourse to perform. To support such a development, an overview is given of existing functional taxonomies for academic discourse and a specific taxonomy is presented of metadiscursive functions. The taxonomy was originally developed based on academic lectures and student essays, but is further developed as applied to spoken student presentations. The second main contribution of the article is the analysis of student presentations. The material is culled from an MA-level English-language online teaching context and compiled into a corpus of 13 presentations (20,000 words and 169 min of presentation time). The qualitative focus of the study is on the taxonomy for how metadiscourse is performed. Quantitative findings regarding the distribution of different types of metadiscourse functions are also included. Despite the widespread practice of student presentations, they have received very little research attention, but the present study maps their key discourse functions.

Mapping the Risk of COVID-19 Contagion at Urban Scale

From the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, several methods have been developed to assess the risk of COVID-19 transmission using spatial units of analysis based on administrative limits (e.g., neighborhoods, census sections, and districts). The main objective of this study is to create a method to assess the risk of contagion within an interurban scale, considering buildings as the smallest unit of analysis. The general risk equation has been the basis to develop the method, individually assessing its components (i.e., hazard, vulnerability, and exposure). Several mapping tools that address the management of the risk of contagion have been proposed, and the main result was the detection of a pattern of contagion and the identification of areas where the risk of contagion was greater. Additionally, the comparison of the risk of a contagion pattern and the population size at an intraurban scale allowed for inferring the specific vulnerability of the population to contagion. The results also showed that there was a direct relation between the risk of contagion and population density, as well as the presence of areas especially vulnerable to contagion.

RITUAL OF LIGHTING AND BURNING AT BARI IMAM SHRINE: DIYA AS A DOMINANT SYMBOL

This article explores the ritual of burning and lighting at a shrine from a symbolic perspective. The study was based on Victor Turner’s theory of rituals and symbols with the objective of applying Turner’s definition and classification of a dominant symbol to the object being used: diya or lamp. The aim was to demonstrate that diya can be categorized as a dominant symbol within the religious rituals being practiced. The data analyzed was collected through participant observation and conversational interviews during ethnographic field work. The research was conducted in Bari Imam shrine, Islamabad, where people from all walks of life come to pay their respects and participate in the rituals, acting out their traditions and beliefs. The findings and their analysis validate Turner’s properties of religious symbol in a ritual, showcasing the fields and foundations of meanings attached to diya, and characteristics or attributes attached to it as a symbol. Theoretical analysis demonstrated the ratchet wheel effect of dominant symbol, highlighting the significance of sub-rituals. This led to the conclusion that rituals have a major function in the society, as they involve symbols which are carriers of meaning. As the smallest unit of analysis, these symbols may not be instantly recognizable, but still manifest the values of a given society. Keywords: Ritual, symbol, diya, ethnography, participant observation, dominant symbol.

Space-time analysis of COVID-19 cases and SARS-CoV-2 wastewater loading: A geodemographic perspective

Severe acute respiratory syndrome - coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) continues to effect communities across the world. One way to combat these effects is to enhance our collective ability to remotely monitor community spread. Monitoring SARS-CoV-2 in wastewater is one approach that enables researchers to estimate the total number of infected people in a region; however, estimates are often made at the sewershed level which may mask the geographic nuance required for targeted interdiction efforts. In this work, we utilize an apportioning method to compare the spatial and temporal trends of daily case count with the temporal pattern of viral load in the wastewater at smaller units of analysis within Austin, TX. We find different lag-times between wastewater loading and case reports. Daily case reports for some locations follow the temporal trend of viral load more closely than others. These findings are then compared to socio-demographic characteristics across the study area.

Spatio-temporal small area surveillance of the COVID-19 pandemic

The emergence of COVID-19 requires new effective tools for epidemiological surveillance. Spatio-temporal disease mapping models, which allow dealing with small units of analysis, are a priority in this context. These models provide geographically detailed and temporally updated overviews of the current state of the pandemic, making public health interventions more effective. These models also allow estimating epidemiological indicators highly demanded for COVID-19 surveillance, such as the instantaneous reproduction number Rt, even for small areas. In this paper, we propose a new spatio-temporal spline model particularly suited for COVID-19 surveillance, which allows estimating and monitoring Rt for small areas. We illustrate our proposal on the study of the disease pandemic in two Spanish regions. As a result, we show how tourism flows have shaped the spatial distribution of the disease in these regions. In these case studies, we also develop new epidemiological tools to be used by regional public health services for small area surveillance.

Socio-economic factors in stimulating agriculture in a crisis

Agriculture faces a series of challenges, i.e. guaranteeing national food security, increasing farmer’s income and reducing the adverse effects on environment and human health associated with the use of fertilizers and biocides. At the same time, the availability of resources (e.g. agricultural land) decreases. The objective of this study in this article is to operationalize a methodology to assess the effectiveness of new crop and livestock technologies in attaining rural development goals. Cropping systems, quantified in terms of inputs and outputs, are used as the smallest unit of analysis in this study. A land use model, based on linear programming techniques, is used to assess the contribution of alternative cropping systems to rural development goals. Results of this study contribute to the formulation of agricultural policies and a research agenda aiming at stimulating rural development.

Review: The Turnout Gap: Race, Ethnicity, and Political Inequality in a Diversifying America, by Bernard L. Fraga

Review: <i>The Turnout Gap: Race, Ethnicity, and Political Inequality in a Diversifying America</i>, by Bernard L. Fraga

Entrepreneurial ecosystems as a bridging concept? A conceptual contribution to the debate on entrepreneurship and regional development

AbstractThis paper explores the potential of considering entrepreneurial ecosystems as a bridging concept that enables a trans‐disciplinary exchange. We aim to contribute to the debate by offering a perspective that takes entrepreneurial ecosystems out of their systemic—often geographically fixed—notion of administrative and territorial boundaries by offering a novel conceptual understanding of it. So far, entrepreneurial ecosystems are appreciated for first exhibiting conceptual strengths in terms of integrating entrepreneurs as economic actors (rather than firms as the smallest unit of analysis), and, second, considering entrepreneurship as a process that focuses on the co‐evolution of entrepreneurial activities and their institutional environment. Criticism of this concept arises on its simplification by translating social elements into entrepreneurial ecosystem terminologies and on focusing on quantifiable indicators for measuring and comparing regional ecosystems rather than appreciating the complexity and interrelatedness of qualitative dimensions and their temporal dynamics. Against this background, we first argue for expanding the debate on entrepreneurial ecosystems by paying particular attention to the spatial as well as to temporal dynamics of entrepreneurship and its environment. Second, we regard entrepreneurial ecosystems as a communicative bridge that enables a fruitful exchange between academic disciplines and practitioners rather than approaching the concept as a mono‐disciplinary theoretical framework.

Using neural-network based paragraph embeddings for the calculation of within and between document similarities

Science mapping using document networks comes often with the implicit assumption that scientific papers are indivisible units with unique links to neighbour documents. Research on proximity in co-citation analysis and the study of lexical properties of sections and citation contexts indicate that this assumption doesn’t always hold. Moreover, the meaning of words and co-words depends on the context in which they appear. This study proposes the use of a neural network architecture for word and paragraph embeddings (Doc2Vec) for the measurement of similarity among those smaller units of analysis. It is shown that paragraphs in the “Introduction” and the “Discussion” Section are more similar to the abstract, that the similarity among paragraphs is related to -but not linearly- the distance between the paragraphs. The “Methodology” Section is least similar to the other sections. Abstracts of citing-cited documents are more similar than random pairs and the context in which a reference appears is most similar to the abstract of the cited document. This novel approach with higher granularity can be used for bibliometric aided retrieval and to assist in measuring interdisciplinarity through the application of network-based centrality measures.

Validating and Refining EPA's Traffic Exposure Screening Measure.

Exposure to high air pollutant concentrations results in significant health risks. Many communities of color and low-income communities face disproportionately higher levels of air pollution exposure. Environmental justice (EJ) screening tools play a critical role in focusing early attention on areas with a high likelihood of disparate health impacts. In 2015, the United States Environmental Protection Agency (US EPA) released EJScreen, a screening tool with indicators of a range of pollution burdens across the US. However, little is known about the accuracy of the screening estimates of pollution exposure. This study compares EJScreen’s traffic proximity air quality metric to dispersion modeling results. Using the area around the Houston Ship Channel, we conduct fine-grained air pollution dispersion modeling to evaluate how closely EJScreen’s indicator approximates estimated roadway air pollution concentrations. We find low correlation between modeled concentrations and the EJScreen roadway air pollution indicator. We extend EJScreen’s roadway air pollution screening method in three ways: (1) using a smaller unit of analysis, (2) accounting for the length of each road segment, and (3) accounting for wind direction. Using the Houston region, we use two of the methods and show that the proposed extensions provide a more accurate transportation air pollution screening assessment at the regional and local level.

Skill transfer, expertise and talent development: An ecological dynamics perspective

In this paper, we propose an ecological dynamics perspective on expertise and talent development, with a focus on the role of skill transfer. The ecological dynamics theoretical framework provides an integrated explanation for human behaviour in sport, predicated on a conceptualisation including constraints on dynamical systems, ecological psychology and a complex systems approach in neurobiology. Three main pillars are presented (i.e., individual-environment coupling as the smallest unit of analysis; adaptation of a complex dynamical system to interacting constraints; and the regulation of action with perception) in order to discuss the functional role of behavioural variability, the usefulness of perceptual-motor exploration and the importance of general and specific skill transfer in the development of talent and expertise in athletes. In addition, practical implications for coaches and instructors are discussed, notably regarding early diversification and unstructured play and activities in talent development programs, but also through variable practice and constraints manipulation.

Functional Zoning for Smart Destination Management

Recent developments in destination management suggest that administrative divisions may be misleading as a unit of decision making for tourism planning and management, since they may comprise several areas with different tourism functionality. Identifying homogenous areas of tourism activity and delimiting their boundaries can enhance the utility of information for smart management purposes. The objective of this paper is to highlight the relevance of the geographical dimension of smart destinations by showing how functional areas can be delimited and how this smaller unit of analysis can improve destination management in the new context of improved availability of data and smart decisions supported by technology. The paper illustrates its key ideas with an application to the island of Gran Canaria.

Geographic information systems for mapping the National Exam Result of Junior High School in 2014 at West Java Province

National Exam level of schooling is implemented by the Ministry of Education and Culture for the development of education in Indonesia. The national examinations are centrally evaluated by the National Education Standards Agency, and the expected implementation of the national exams can describe the successful implementation of education at the district, municipal, provincial, or national level. In this study, we evaluate, analyze, and explore the implementation of the national exam database of the results of the Junior High School in 2014, with the Junior High School (SMP/MTs) as the smallest unit of analysis at the district level. The method used in this study is a data mining approach using the methodology of Knowledge Discovery in Databases (KDD) using descriptive analysis and spatial mapping of national examinations. The results of the classification of the data mining process to national exams of Junior High School in 2014 using data 6,878 SMP/MTs in West Java showed that 81.01 % were at moderate levels. While the results of the spatial mapping for SMP/MTs in West Java can be explained 36,99 % at the unfavorable level. The evaluation results visualization in graphic is done using ArcGIS to provide position information quality of education in municipal, provincial or national level. The results of this study can be used by management to make decision to improve educational services based on the national exam database in West Java. Keywords: KDD, spatial mapping, national exam.

Returning Struggles to the Practice Turn: How Were Bourdieu and Boltanski Lost in (Some) Translations and What to Do about It?

This article argues for bringing struggles back into the practice turn in international political sociology. It will unpack a set of theoretical distinctions to respond to the following questions: How does one describe practices (relationalism vs. substantialism)? Where do practices occur (fields vs. communities)? How do practices change (disputes vs. struggles)? This article criticizes Pouliot and Adler for removing struggles from Bourdieu’s structural constructivism in order to frame practices as “the smallest unit of analysis” (Adler and Pouliot, 2011b, 10-13) in international relations (IR). The paper also takes stock of the constitutive differences between Bourdieu’s and Boltanski’s sociologies. It thereby faults Gadinger and Bueger’s practice theory for obfuscating these differences. Finally, in foregrounding struggles as a specifically social-constructivist concept, the argument will call for a more complex sociological understanding of conflict and change in IR. The analytical power of each set of theoretical distinction is illustrated through a case study of bordering struggles in post–Soviet Central Asia.

GEOBIA For Land Use Mapping Using Worldview2 Image In Bengkak Village Coastal, Banyuwangi Regency, East Java

The east coast of Banyuwangi regency has a diverse variety of land use such as ponds, mangroves, agricultural fields and settlements. WorldView-2 is a multispectral image with high spatial resolution that can display detailed information of land use. Geographic Object Based Image Analysis (GEOBIA) classification technique uses object segments as the smallest unit of analysis. The segmentation and classification process is not only based on spectral value of the image but also considering other elements of the image interpretation. This gives GEOBIA an opportunities and challenges in the mapping and monitoring of land use. This research aims to assess the GEOBIA classification method for generating the classification of land use in coastal areas of Banyuwangi. The result of this study is land use classification map produced by GEOBIA classification. We verified the accuracy of the resulted land use map by comparing the map with result from visual interpretation of the image that have been validated through field surveys. Variation of land use in most of the east coast of Banyuwangi regency is dominated by mangrove, agricultural fields, mixed farms, settlements and ponds.

The importance of historical methods for building theories of urban environmental inequality

Despite the large body of research, testable theories of the development of urban environmental inequality are still lacking. Instead, we have only a group of unconnected explanations for environmental inequality; the time in history in which they may operate, and the extent to which they can be generalized remain unspecified. Many (although not all) quantitative environmental justice studies use very small units of analysis, are cross-sectional, and use simplistic concepts of race and social class. The generalizability of historical qualitative studies tracing the process through which environmental inequality developed has not been specified. In this paper, I argue for the use of historical methods such as causal process tracing (CPT) to bridge the shortcomings of both quantitative empirical findings and qualitative historical case studies as material to build middle-range theory. Using material from my recent multi-method work tracing the development of environmental inequality in the Philadelphia area, I demonstrate the efficacy of historical methods (path dependence and CPT) for understanding the causal mechanisms that gave rise to environmentally burdened communities in the Philadelphia area. Hypotheses generated by the causal mechanisms and historical turning points identified in Philadelphia can be used to test the generalizability of middle-range theories of environmental inequality.

What We Can Learn from Small Units of Analysis

This article provides motivation for examining small geographic units of analysis based on a causal logic framework. Local, spatial, and contextual effects are confounded when using larger units of analysis, as well as treatment effect heterogeneity. I relate these types of confounds to all types of aggregation problems, including temporal aggregation, and aggregation of dependent or explanatory variables. Unlike prior literature critiquing the use of aggregate level data, examples are provided where aggregation is unlikely to hinder the goals of the particular research design, and how heterogeneity of measures in smaller units of analysis is not a sufficient motivation to examine small geographic units. Examples of these confounds are presented using simulation with a dataset of crime at micro place street units (i.e. street segments and intersections) in Washington, D.C.

Modeling Public Decision Preferences Using Context-Specific Value Hierarchies

Although a universal hierarchy of public values has proven elusive, the literature in individual-level values suggests that decision makers do organize their personal values into hierarchies based on context. Through analysis of public values and public decision preferences gathered in a pilot study of city-level public administrators ( n = 182), we use an empirical approach to identify context-relevant public values for five different decision contexts. We then demonstrate multiple possible approaches to modeling individual- and community-level policy preferences based on value hierarchies derived from the individual-level data. We find that the predictions based on value hierarchies are better than would be predicted in the absence of such hierarchies, and that these differences are statistically significant. These findings suggest that while creating a universal hierarchy of values remains challenging, context-relevant public value hierarchies at smaller units of analysis may be useful in describing, predicting, and explaining the decisions of public administrators.