Thematic Coherence Research Articles

11.D. Scientific session: Participatory approaches and co-creation in complex interventions to reduce inequity in health

Abstract The escalating challenges posed by climate change and rapid urbanization demand an integrated understanding of how our natural and built environments influence health outcomes. This workshop aims to dissect the complex associations between the environment-both natural and constructed-and physical and mental health. The urgency and breadth of these issues necessitate a multidisciplinary approach, leveraging insights from environmental science, public health, and urban planning. The primary objective of this workshop is to elucidate the multifaceted relationships between environmental conditions and health, identifying actionable strategies to mitigate adverse health outcomes and enhance well-being. Specific goals include: i) to assess the current scientific evidence linking various environmental factors with health, highlighting the role of climate change; ii) to explore innovative methodologies for studying environmental impacts on health; and iii) to foster collaboration among researchers, policymakers, and practitioners for integrated health and environmental planning. Organizing this workshop presents several unique added values. First, it serves as a platform for experts from diverse fields to share findings and refine research methodologies. Second, by synthesizing current knowledge, the workshop will inform more coherent and science-based public health and urban policy. Lastly, it could facilitate networking among stakeholders, fostering collaborations that bridge gaps between research and policy implementation. The workshop is structured to ensure thematic coherence and maximally beneficial interactions among participants. Presentations will be grouped into four thematic blocks: 1. effects of climate change on health; 2. healthy design and public mental health; 3. Planetary health challenges to human health; 4. Climate change perception and mental health. During the workshop, each speech will be built on the previous one in a sequential way. At the end of the workshop, audience members could join the discussion offering their point of view and directly interacting with the speakers. This workshop stands as a crucial endeavor to integrate diverse perspectives on how environmental conditions impact health and to catalyze significant strides in public health and urban planning. It promises to not only advance scientific understanding but also to translate this knowledge into practical, scalable solutions for health resilience in our communities. Key messages • Urban health is foundational for sustainable cities, integrating health into all policies ensures inclusive, safe, resilient communities as outlined in SDG 11. • Public health influenced by environmental and local government strategies highlights the need for multidisciplinary approaches to adapt urban planning and health policies.

Defining Unique Features of Discourse in Club of Funny and Inventive: A Study of Humor in KVN Performances

This article focuses on identifying the distinctive characteristics of discourse within the "Club of the Funny and Inventive" (Russ. KVN). The primary material for this study consists of team performances from the KVN television show. Attention is given to the challenge of defining the concept of discourse, along with a review of major approaches to its interpretation. It is demonstrated that humorous performances in KVN can be analyzed within the existing scientific paradigm as a communicative figure comprising three components: "reality – text – discourse," as well as being viewed as a specific communicative event. The authors examine the ontological characteristics of humor, highlighting its basis in contradiction and its sociocultural nature. Functions such as communication, socialization, identification, and differentiation facilitated by humor are described. The relevance of this research is underscored by the significance of KVN as a cultural phenomenon in shaping and developing humorous discourse as a whole. The article posits that KVN can be regarded as a distinct variety of humorous discourse due to its thematic and stylistic coherence. It is suggested that the specific characteristics and conditions governing KVN lead to the emergence of traits similar to those found in institutional discourse. The novelty of this study lies in articulating the antinomic characteristics of KVN discourse, concluding that their existence is intrinsically linked to the foundational contrast inherent in humor itself.

Personality traits and narrative Identity: Changes in Mid-Adolescence to emerging adulthood in Relation to Well-Being

Limited research addresses personality shifts from mid-adolescence to emerging adulthood, alongside well-being. This study analysed Big Five trait and narrative identity change (thematic coherence, causal coherence, resolution valence) across 111 individuals (46.8% female) aged 15/16 who were reassessed at age 21. Neuroticism, conscientiousness, thematic coherence, and causal coherence rose, lacking stability for the latter two; extraversion decreased. Thematic coherence correlated with agreeableness and lower conscientiousness in mid-adolescence, and lower depression at emerging adulthood. Causal coherence correlated with conscientiousness, and lower depression. Extraversion, agreeableness, conscientiousness, and openness correlated with better well-being, particularly at emerging adulthood. Causal coherence correlated with self-esteem; mid-adolescents’ negative resolution valence predicted later depression and poorer self-esteem, controlling for traits. Findings imply distinct trait and narrative identity trajectories.

Decision dynamics and landscape approach by individuals and collective groups: the case of Japanese rural land use in agricultural, forest, and boundary areas in an era of population decline

Establishing a decision-making scheme for multiple land use types in a shrinking society is an urgent and persistent task. In particular, residents and governments face the complexity of cross-sectoral visions over concerned landscapes. This study examined the preference of residents for future visions and the effects of group deliberation in a Japanese rural community to enhance the current understanding of decision and learning processes on cross-sectoral land use types (i.e., agricultural land, forest land, and boundary areas) across ages and groups. This study posed the following questions: (i) what types of interactions do residents find among options on cross-sectoral land uses? and (ii) how do group deliberation influence the individual preferences of residents for land use? In the survey, the residents disclosed their preferences for the prepared visions over three land use types. The survey also enabled the comparison of choices before and after group deliberation. Regarding question (i), the residents’ choice prior to the deliberation demonstrated thematic coherence through land use categories. Smart technology and potential productivity improvement were selected across agriculture and forests. However, regarding question (ii), thematic coherence decreased after the group deliberation. The residents could communicate disagreements during group deliberation and consider the issues relatively independently over land use types, which separately views agriculture lands and forests. The choice after group discussions became increasingly embedded and influenced by residential areas and land ownership of residents. These findings provide unique insights into the group discussion on how individual decisions are affected. In summary, the preferences of cross-sectoral land use types did not converge but tended to diverge.

Narrating lives across 16 years: Developmental trajectories of coherence and relations to well-being in a lifespan sample.

The ability to narrate a life coherently develops first in adolescence, but little is known about its course across adulthood and into old age. Also, the potential association of life narrative coherence with well-being has never been studied. Our aim was to investigate lifespan development of coherence and associations with well-being using data from the longitudinal MainLife study. A total of 172 urban Germans (8-80 years; 87 females) narrated their lives up to six times across 16 years (N = 803 brief entire life narratives). Most were highly educated, and the proportion of a migration background was typical for the local population. Life narratives were rated for three types of global coherence (temporal, causal-motivational, and thematic) and coded for two types of autobiographical arguments (stability maintaining and change engendering). Multilevel models were used to investigate their lifespan development and relations to well-being. While most life narrative measures increased up to emerging adulthood and then remained stable, thematic coherence continued to increase into middle adulthood. Only change-engendering autobiographical arguments slowly decreased from midlife onward. Unexpectedly, neither autobiographical arguments nor global coherence correlated significantly with well-being. Data exploration suggested an association between thematic coherence and self-continuity. We conclude that life narrative coherence may only be related to well-being if samples include cases with more extreme noncoherence (e,g., clinical disorders). Our findings add to understanding the development of the life story across the lifespan, especially in older age, and suggest studying relations of coherence, self-continuity, and well-being specifically in life crises and in clinical samples. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2024 APA, all rights reserved).

Clarifying Glycerol Electrooxidation Studies on Pd-Based Catalysts: Insights Into Catalytic Performance and Practical Challenges.

Escalating biodiesel production led to a surplus of glycerol, prompting its exploration as a valuable resource in industrial applications. Electrochemical systems have been studied, specifically employing noble metal catalysts like palladium for glycerol electrooxidation. Despite numerous studies on Pd-based catalysts for glycerol electrooxidation, a comprehensive analysis addressing critical questions related to the economic feasibility, global sourcing of Pd, and the thematic cohesion of publications in this field is lacking. Moreover, a standardized framework for comparing the results of various studies is absent, hindering progress on glycerol technologies. This critical overview navigates the evolution of Pd-based catalysts for glycerol electrooxidation, examining catalytic activity, stability, and potential applications. It critically addresses the geographical sources of Pd, the motivation behind glycerol technology exploration, thematic coherence in existing publications, and the meaningful comparison of results. It correlates the use of Pd-based catalysts with the natural source of Pd and the origin of glycerol derived from biodiesel. The proposed standardized approach for comparing electrochemical parameters and establishing experimental protocols provides a foundation for meaningful study comparisons. This critical overview underscores the need to address fundamental questions to accelerate the transition of glycerol technologies from laboratories to practical applications.

Measuring narrative identity: rater coding versus questionnaire-based approaches

ABSTRACT Narrative identity – how individuals narrate their lived and remembered past – is usually assessed via independent rater coding, but new methods relying on self-report have been introduced. To test the assumption that different methods assess aspects of the same underlying construct, studies measuring similar components of narrative identity with different methods are needed. However, such studies are surprisingly rare. To begin to fill this gap, the present study compared the narrative variables, temporal coherence, causal coherence, and thematic coherence, measured via rater coding of participants’ self-generated narratives of the remembered past and via subscales of the self-report measure Awareness of Narrative Identity Questionnaire (ANIQ). The results showed that the ANIQ subscales did not correlate significantly with their corresponding rater-coded dimension, and that the ANIQ subscales were generally unrelated to the other rater-coded dimensions. Furthermore, an exploratory factor analysis demonstrated that the ANIQ subscales loaded together on a factor that did not include any rater-coded variables. The findings suggest that the narrative variables share little empirical overlap when assessed via the ANIQ and rater coding of self-generated narratives.

Appropriating Hafez’s ghazals for Shiite rites and rituals in the Islamic Republic of Iran

ABSTRACT The poetry of the Iran-Iraq War (1980–1988) is commonly grafted to classical Persian topoi, imagery, metaphors. Several war poets use classical poetry to communicate with their audiences as this poetry is familiar and they can effortlessly convey their political and ideological message. This article investigates how modern amateur poets use classical poetry to create their own poems for political and religious use. I shall specifically analyse a few instances in which the poetry of the classical Persian poet Hafez of Shiraz (1315–1390) is integrated in various ideologically Shiite contexts. Some scholars have argued that Hafez’s ghazals have little cohesion, characterizing the poem’s couplets as ‘pearls at random strung’, but as we shall see these ghazals enjoy thematic coherence, even their ambiguity creates spaces for a modern appropriation and interpolation of couplets in his poetry, allowing the use of a poem as a commentary on religious and political events. While I shall give attention to Hafez’s art of poetry, my main focus will be upon the modern application of his poetry by professional Shiite singers (maddāḥs) who perform such poems to whet the emotions of their audiences, placing the poem in a purely Shiite or ideologically Islamist propaganda.

A Data-Driven Approach for Integrating Multi-Source Scientific Categorization Labels

This study presents a novel framework for integrating scientific categorization labels from diverse sources, thereby addressing the complexities introduced by varying classification systems in the scientific literature. Utilizing a SciBERT-based encoder and classification prediction models, this research proposes a method to effectively map and integrate labels across different databases. Our approach involves encoding the titles of scientific documents into vectorized embeddings, training a classification model on these embeddings, and then employing this model to categorize and harmonize labels from various sources. We apply this methodology to datasets from the 2017 National Natural Science Foundation of China (NSFC) and the Chinese Science Citation Database (CSCD), demonstrating the framework’s ability to improve label consistency and thematic coherence across multiple scientific disciplines. The results highlight a significant enhancement in the navigation and understanding of scientific literature, showcasing the potential of this approach to facilitate more efficient and integrated management of scientific knowledge.

“Where’s My People?”: An Investigation of the Structure and Content of Black and Latinx College Students’ Ethnic-Racial Identity Narratives

As attending college became a normative life experience in the U.S., society developed a cultural narrative about what a “good” college experience looks like. But, for racially minoritized college students, this master narrative often excludes their experiences. Integrating narrative and ethnic-racial identity, the current study investigates how a sample of 11 Black and Latinx students ( M age = 19.73) narrate their lives in college and make meaning of their racial experiences. Participants were prompted to construct their college story as if it were a book with chapters and describe the connections between those chapters. We analyzed students’ college stories and found that they used either chronological or thematic coherence to structure their narratives; this distinction in structure was related to the content of their stories. We discuss the theoretical and practical implications of using a racialized college story narrative to understand ethnic-racial identity for minoritized college students.

Staging Joyce’s Prose – Zenon Fajfer and Katarzyna Bazarnik’s Finnegans Make

The purpose of the paper is to examine Finnegans Make, Zenkasi Theatre Company’s adaptation of Joyce’s prose devised and directed by Zenon Fajfer and Katarzyna Bazarnik, staged in the 1990s. It aims to demonstrate how by employing avant-garde compositional ideas and language games, they translate the structural and linguistic complexity characteristic of the Irish author to the idiom of the stage. demonstrate the thematic coherence of Joyce’s work, accompanied by compositional and. It analyses in detail the play’s circular structure that draws on excerpts from Dubliners, A Portrait of the Artist, Ulysses and Finnegans Wake. It also discusses how Fajfer and Bazarnik engage the audience and explore the theatre space. Finally, it examines how they use the space of the book and typographical devices to translate the live performance into a spatialised score of the play.

Narrative Identity, Sense of Self and Meaning in Life in Emirati and U.S.-American Women

ABSTRACT Coherent personal narratives employed for self-understanding (self function) and social proximity (social function) are theorized to inform life and the sense of self with meaning. Yet, it has not been tested whether this rather individualistic notion of narrative identity holds true across cultures. Therefore, this study investigates potential cultural differences in the extent to which narrative identity of Emirati and U.S.-American female undergraduates reflect and relate to meaning in life and the sense of self. Results showed that the U.S.-American narratives were more thematically coherent and served the self and social functions more than the Emirati narratives. Thematic coherence and self function related significantly to meaning in life in the Emirati subsample, but surprisingly not in the U.S.-American subsample. In both samples, the social function related to self-concept clarity and the sense of coherence. These results further our understanding on cultural differences in constructing meaning in life and the sense of self through narrative identity.

‘View’ and ‘Process’: Early British Industrial Films and Visual Culture

Scholarship on the ‘industrial film’ has tended to focus on the kinds of films produced within and for industrial organisations, from the 1910s onwards, and their many uses in education, advertising, and government. This article looks to the commercial antecedents of this tradition in Britain, namely the Edwardian industrial film ‘genre’, produced in vast quantities as theatrical entertainments for the popular market. It assesses both the aesthetics of these films and the discourses surrounding them, and explores how early filmmakers understood the uses and purposes of industrial films. The article argues that, although Edwardian industrial films were marketed as educational products, they lacked the temporal and thematic coherence required to meet filmmakers’ educational aspirations. Here the argument departs from several analyses that have foregrounded the way these films utilised ‘processual representation’. The article then sketches out the trajectories of industrial filmmaking during and after the First World War, when industrial films transitioned into new forms. The article concludes by considering the significance of that shift for the changing meaning of spectatorship across the early twentieth century.

Narrative identity and positive youth development in Turkish emerging adults: The moderating role of cultural self-construals

The current study examined the associations between narrative coherence, the 5Cs of positive youth development, and cultural self-construals among 91 Turkish emerging adults (48 females, 42 males, and 1 other ) aged between 18 and 29 ( Mage = 23.01, SD = .52). Emerging adults partook in a life story interview to share three important narratives involving parental interactions that were assessed for causal and thematic coherence. Participants also self-reported on their positive development (competence, confidence, character, caring, and connection) and cultural self-construals (autonomy, relatedness, and autonomy relatedness). Results of path analysis revealed that high causal coherence in narratives was associated with lower levels of competence, confidence, and connection, whereas high thematic coherence was linked to higher levels of competence, confidence, and connection. Further, we examined the role of cultural self-construals in moderating the link between narrative coherence and the 5Cs. Thematic coherence was related to decreased caring when autonomy was high and relatedness was low. Thematic coherence was also related to increased connection only when autonomy was low and relatedness was high. Moreover, causal coherence was related to decreased caring and connection for emerging adults with highly autonomous self-construals. Similarly, causal coherence was associated with lower levels of confidence for emerging adults with high autonomous-related self-construals. Implications for research with Turkish emerging adults are discussed.

ԱԲՐԱՀԱՄ ԼԻՆՔՈԼՆԻ ՔԱՂԱՔԱԿԱՆ ԵԼՈՒՅԹՆԵՐԻ ԹԱՐԳՄԱՆԱԿԱՆ ԱՌԱՆՁՆԱՀԱՏԿՈՒԹՅՈՒՆՆԵՐԸ (ԱՆԳԼԵՐԵՆ)

Political discourse analysis (PDA) is an inter-and multidisciplinary research that focuses on the linguistic and discursive dimensions of political text and talk and on the political nature of the discursive practice. It indicates unity of communicative intentions which are always intentional and the public speaker has three primary goals when delivering his message: to inform, trigger and arouse an emotional response and to persuade his audience. Hence, the discourse analysis cannot operate solely within a linguistic and discursive framework and must draw upon methods, frameworks of other disciplines to analyze adequately its object of study. It is multidisciplinary as it brings together multiple disciplines to investigate socio-political issues and phenomena pertinent to various areas of scholarship. Political discourse is also regarded as a process of real-life verbal communication where the systemic characteristics of language, the degree of spontaneity and completeness, thematic coherence and clarity of ideas are of special importance.

Scientific interpretations of discursive competence in teaching a foreign language to students of higher and secondary education

The paper presents a diachronic analysis of existing concepts of discursive competence and features of its formation among college students. Two stages of discursive competence (DC) studies are considered, including Western and domestic linguistic studies. The stages of development of the concept of discursive competence are traced based on the theory of communicative competence of D. Haims and N. Chomsky, which was then continued in the works of Canale and Swain and conceptualized for educational purposes by Celce-Murcia, Dornier and Turell. The component composition of the DC includes, according to Celce-Murcia, the categories of connectivity, integrity, conversational structures, compliance with the order in conversation. The Council of Europes Language Policy Regulation (CEFR) on the essence of discursive competence, which includes the students ability to arrange proposals in the desired sequence, was also considered. Russian linguists and teachers also contributed to the understanding of the recreation center, in particular, N.D. Arutyunova, L.O. Gelivera, A.G. Gorbunov, E.N. Elistratova, N.V. Popova and others. In a generalized form, according to their opinions, the formation of the recreation center includes the creation of coherent statements in compliance with their thematic organization, cohesion and coherence, the interaction of the author with the reader within the functional style required by the communication situation. The novelty of the presented research is to consider the methodology for forming a discursive competence in classes on a foreign language in college, using the authors textbook on discursive analysis. Experimentally, the author defines the main components of the formation of foreign-language discursive competence of college students and discloses their content for the implementation of oral and written communication of students.

Revision of Internal Structure and Ordering of the Qurʼānic Sūras 105 al–Fīl and 106 Quraysh: Structural and Rhetorical Analysis

The article analyses two suras of the Qur’an (Q. 105 and Q. 106) within the scope of the hypothesis that they initially constituted a textual unity. This assumption was presented by some reports of early Muslim traditions. Several modern researchers also mentioned the thematic coherence of these two suras. Structural analysis of the rhyming endings in both suras and distribution of their thematic units give new insights about supposed previous initial composition of the text. Rhetorical side of the revelation was also analysed according to the concept of emotional plots. These new arguments reinforce the idea that Q. 105 and Q. 106 were revealed as one distinctive piece of the Qur’anic text.

Sarah Haggarty and Jon Mee, eds., <i>Blake and Conflict</i>

With Blake and Conflict Palgrave Macmillan extends its role as the academic press now most consistently showcasing new Blake scholarship. The volume presents selected revised papers from a conference of the same title held in Oxford in 2006. Although it does not entirely surmount the miscellaneous quality that most conference anthologies have, synergies among several contributions provide a fairly strong thematic coherence. Sarah Haggarty and Jon Mee’s introduction outlines two kinds of conflict as salient for the volume, both involving the conversation of “Visionary forms dramatic” that Blake envisions in humanity’s future (Jerusalem 98, E 257). The first centers on ideological or intellectual conflict as an aspect of pluralistic harmony: Blake, the editors say, imagines “the kind of community that arises from the communication between differences” (4). A second, more mundane, type of conflict involves Blake’s contentious “relationships with his precursors and precursor texts,” and these too, for the editors, are relationships among “Contraries,” so that conflict emerges as a “risk inherent in fully engaging with the other” (4, 5). This breakdown, however, only partly accounts for the volume’s contents; more than half the essays involve “conflict” with recent views of Blake or Blake-like ideas as complicit with imperialism and its ideological categories, with elite political domination, or with masculinist gender conceptions. These essays suggest a turn away from a “complicit” Blake by at least some now working in the field.

Kaplinski joon ja Rummo sädemed. Struktuurivõrdlus / Kaplinski’s Line and Rummo’s Sparks: A Structural Comparison

Artikkel analüüsib Jaan Kaplinski ja Paul-Eerik Rummo luuletuste struktuuri visualiseeriva pragmapoeetika abil. Käsitlus lähtub Roman Jakobsoni loodud poeetilise funktsiooni lingvistilisest teooriast, mis tõlgendab luulet kui seotud kõnet. See tähendab keele paradigmavälja elementide projitseerimist kõne süntaksiteljele ehk keelevaramu parallelismide korrastatud suunamist värssidesse. Kaplinski tekstide semantiline kumulatsioon, mis koondub luuletuse kujundliku sõnumi kui juhtmotiivi ümber, ilmutab tavalisest suuremat paradigmaühtsust. Rummolik struktuur läheneb veelgi enam sünkroonilisele paradigmaväljale, millega kaasneb süžeelisuse tugevam fragmenteerumine. See võib viia nii narratiivi kui ka keelelise sidususe kohatise vaibumiseni.
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 The article discusses the structure of Jaan Kaplinski’s and Paul-Eerik Rummo’s poetry through making use of visualising pragmapoetics. The discussion proceeds from Roman Jakobson’s linguistic theory of the poetic function that treats poetry as bound speech. This involves projecting elements from the paradigm field of language on the syntax axis of speech, that is, systematised directing into verse of parallelisms to be found language.
 The semantic accumulation of Kaplinski’s texts that condenses around the poems’ figurative message emerging as a leitmotif demonstrates a paradigmatic unity greater than that commonly found in traditional poetry, which finds expression in the amplification of catalogues or lists of words and concepts. For instance, the ballad “Üks kuningas oli kord maata” (“Once there was a king without a kingdom”) contains 22 references to the motif of land/earth and 27 to the king and his crown/throne. Around this, motifs of waiting, feeling sad, growing old, dying and decaying, as well as a rich vocabulary connected with burials become consolidated. The 18-sentence text “Luuletused on elanud maakeral juba eotseenist saadik…” (“Poems have been living on Earth since the Eocene epoch”), that reminds of an entry in a reference work, includes altogether 23 references to the word/concept “poem” that is in a substitutive dialogue with the word and concept “elephant” that the text proceeds from; thus, it contains twice 23, that is altogether 46, accumulating references. These form a dense paradigmatic web (rhizome) with points of converence that is brought together into a plotted narrative that dynamically sketches the semantic field and foregrounds it.
 The catalogue structure of Rummo’s poetry is similar to that of Kaplinski, but it often comes even closer to the synchronic paradigmatic field, which is accompanied by an increased fragmentation of a lyrical-narrative plot. This may lead to a noticeable decrease of both thematic and linguistic coherence, which on occasion can even approach glossolalia. If Kaplinski is consistent in retaining his ideological plotline that runs through the expanded paradigm field of his text as a leitmotif and keeps it together, Rummo in his “casting of sparks”, as he puts it in one of his poems, can employ parallel alternative plot rudiments and a narrative that has a tendency to disperse. To put it as a metaphor, one is characterised by a method reminiscent of a single-furrow plough, the other has the effect of a hay rake with multiple teeth. It can be claimed that, in comparison with Kaplinski’s structure, Rummo’s structure as a secondary modelling system employs an additional formal filter of the next level that finds expression in an increased fragmentation of the expression axis and a more pluralised explication of the paradigm field than in Kaplinski’s case. If Kaplinski’s model represents a clear creation of clarity, then Rummo’s is more of a dispersed creation of clarity. The former as a “less complex” method has proved to be quantitively more fruitful, the latter seems more “experimental” in its turn. Their similarities and differences prove them both to be of a high artistic value.

Contrasting National Plant Protection Needs, Perceptions and Techno-Scientific Capabilities in the Asia-Pacific Region

Pests and pathogens inflict considerable losses in global agri-food production and regularly trigger the (indiscriminate) use of synthetic pesticides. In the Asia-Pacific, endemic and invasive organisms compromise crop yields, degrade farm profitability and cause undesirable social-environmental impacts. In this study, we systematically assess the thematic foci, coherence and inclusiveness of plant protection programs of 11 Asia-Pacific countries. Among 23 economically important diseases and 55 pests, survey respondents identified rice blast, rice brown planthopper, citrus greening disease, Tephritid fruit flies and fall armyworm as threats of regional allure. These organisms are thought to lower crop yields by 20–35% and cause management expenditures up to US$2,250 per hectare and year. Though decision-makers are familiar with integrated pest management (IPM), national programs are invariably skewed toward curative pesticide-intensive control. Pesticide reductions up to 50–100% are felt to be feasible and potentially can be attained through full-fledged IPM campaigns and amended policies. To rationalize farmers' pesticide use, decision criteria (e.g., economic thresholds) wait to be defined for multiple crop x pest systems and (participatory) training needs to be conducted e.g., on (pest, disease) symptom recognition or field-level scouting. Efforts are equally needed to amend stakeholder perceptions on ecologically based measures e.g., biological control. Given that several Asia–Pacific countries possess robust techno-scientific capacities in various IPM domains (e.g., taxonomy, molecular diagnostics, socioeconomics), they can take on an active role in regionally coordinated campaigns. As such, one can reinvigorate IPM and ensure that preventative, non-chemical pest management ultimately becomes the norm instead of the exception throughout the Asia–Pacific.