Unoccupied Time Research Articles

Social and psychological characteristics of personal alienation of older people during the war

In times of war, the elderly are a vulnerable category of the population that experiences not only material losses but also significant psychological and social challenges. Observing and studying the social and psychological characteristics of personal alienation of this group of people is an urgent task, as it can determine the quality of their lives and contribute to the development of effective support programmes. The article presents a study of the socio-psychological factors of personal alienation of the elderly. The authors analyse and consider the main approaches to understanding the concept of alienation. The article describes the author's model of the emergence of personal alienation in the elderly, which demonstrates the mechanism and process of the emergence and development of personal alienation in the elderly, and also considers the peculiarities of experiencing personal alienation by the elderly during the war. The model of personal alienation includes: a change in social status, an increase in the amount of unoccupied time, a decrease in the number of social contacts and a decrease in social activity, which in turn lead to the experience of non-compliance with social norms and standards, which causes a limitation of own resources and leads to personal alienation. The article also presents and discusses the author's structural model of personal alienation of the elderly. The proposed structural model identifies the socio-psychological and psychological factors that characterise the personal alienation of the elderly. The socio-psychological factors include: refusal to participate in the affairs of society, reduced social responsibility and social distancing. The psychological factors of personal alienation include: isolation, maladaptability, consistency in achieving goals, life goals, interest in life, conscious loneliness, emotional rejection of the present, negative assessment of the past, and anxiety. Personal alienation leads to a loss of subjectivity, which, due to the reduction of social contacts and social exclusion, further intensifies the experience of personal alienation by older people.

Habits and Routines of Adults in Early Recovery From Substance Use Disorder: Clinical and Research Implications From a Mixed Methodology Exploratory Study.

The purpose of this exploratory, non-experimental mixed methods study was to analyze the habits and routines of adults in early recovery (>3 months) from substance use disorder (SUD). Participants (N = 14) were recruited from an intensive outpatient treatment (IOP) program for substance use disorders. Data collection consisted of a demographic survey, a researcher developed Daily Occupational Questionnaire (DOQ), and follow-up semi-structured interviews with 5 randomly selected participants. Quantitative results indicate rest as the most frequently engaged in activity on the most busy (31.0%) and least busy day (36.6%). There was no significant difference, t(13) = 0.117, P = .909, between newly established activities on the most busy and least busy day. Qualitative themes included 1. The most difficult time of day is often related to patterns of unused time. 2. When there is a lack of structure or unoccupied time, they return to their previously established positive supports. 3. There is a need for consistency and structure for developing anticipated/perceived routines. Implications for all healthcare and clinical providers working with this population, as well as research suggestions, are outlined.

Make waiting not to seem like waiting: Capacity management of waiting-area entertainment

To operationalize the psychological principle that “occupied time feels shorter than unoccupied time”, it is common for service providers to offer entertainment options in the waiting areas. Typical examples that put in practice this mechanism include amusement parks, car dealers, airports, hospitals, restaurants, etc. In this paper, we study a queueing system where the server provides entertainment services to waiting customers. Assuming customers are strategic and delay-sensitive, we formulate a game-theoretical model and study customers' equilibrium behavior in response to this mechanism. Because offering waiting-area entertainment incurs extra operational costs, we discuss whether and when this option will benefit the service provider and obtain the optimal entertainment capacity that maximizes the system's profit. Our analysis reveals that this option is appealing if and only if the market size is intermediate and that the optimal capacity of the entertainment is a unimodal function in the market size. Our insights continue to remain valid when the service fee becomes endogenous.

From the drama of unoccupied time and isolation due to Covid-19’s pandemic to the need for person-centered care at residential care facilities in Portugal

During the pandemic, restrictive measures were implemented at Portuguese residential care facilities (PRCF), such as isolating residents and ceasing collective activities. It is important to understand how PRCF are implementing activities that allow residents to occupy their time and fight isolation. As such, we aim to analyze whether: 1. new activities were implemented for residents (identifying which were carried out); 2. occupation activities were provided to isolated residents in their rooms (identifying which were carried out); 3. the implementation of activities is associated with variables like the amount of staff. This is an exploratory, quantitative, and cross-sectional study. An online questionnaire was sent by email to 2325 PRCF and entities were asked to share it with their workers. The study was also divulged on social networks. Data collection occurred between July 8th and October 18th, 2020. The study had 784 staff members participating and 90.8% reported that new activities were implemented at their facilities, predominantly videocalls. Concerning isolated residents most respondents (64.4%) stated that providing activities was impossible. Results showed that those PRCF that expanded teams had a higher percentage of new activities and activities with residents isolated in bedrooms. These results are alarming because while residents should have had more resources to cope with the pandemic, higher risks of unoccupied time and isolation existed, a dramatic situation for its potentially harmful consequences. Focusing on sanitary issues (and less on older adults) may reinforce traditional care models that had shown negative impacts before the pandemic. This highlights the need to evolve the care paradigm during and beyond the pandemic at PRCF: with Person-Centered Care as an option.

Air Handling Unit Shutdowns During Scheduled Unoccupied Hours: US Commercial Building Stock Prevalence and Energy Impact

Abstract Commercial buildings account for 18% of U.S. energy consumption, with 44% used for heating, ventilation, and air conditioning (HVAC). American Society of Heating, Refrigerating and Air Conditioning Engineers (ASHRAE) 90.1 requires HVAC systems to shutdown fans and outdoor air ventilation during unoccupied times, only allowing fans to cycle on, without outdoor air, to maintain thermostat setpoints. However, it is minimally understood how often existing building operations align with energy code requirements and the energy implications of not doing so. This study used building automation system data from 843 buildings containing 5706 air handling units (AHUs) to determine three unoccupied AHU shutdown control schemes ranging in efficiency and then estimated their prevalence in the U.S. commercial building stock, segmented by building type. ComStock was then used to analyze the energy savings potential of implementing the most energy efficient unoccupied shutdown control scheme in non-participating buildings across the U.S commercial building stock. Results show that only 23% of AHUs align completely with the ASHRAE 90.1 requirement. ComStock modeling results show 4% annual stock energy savings by switching all non-participating buildings to the most efficient scheme, with 19% annual energy savings demonstrated for the median building switching from the least efficient scheme to the most efficient. Findings also show 114.5 TBtu electricity and 75.8 TBtu natural gas fuel savings when converting to the most efficient scheme. These findings help stakeholders understand the high prevalence of buildings not aligning with the ASHRAE-90.1 requirements for unoccupied AHU shutdowns and the energy savings potential of utilizing the most efficient unoccupied AHU shutdown scheme.

Movement behaviours and health of children and youth with disabilities: Impact of the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic.

This study examined the acute and longer-term impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on the movement behaviours and health of children and youth with disabilities (CYD) in Canada. Eighty-six parents of CYD completed an online survey twice (May 2020 and November 2020). Interviews were completed with seven families in March 2021. At both time points, <20% of CYD met the physical activity and sedentary behaviour guidelines, and >50% of CYD met the sleep guideline. No CYD met all three movement guidelines. Nearly one-quarter of CYD reported declines in health from pre-pandemic levels. Interview themes revealed that shifting of routines, unoccupied time, reduced physiotherapy opportunities, parental capacity, and the social and built environment all impacted the movement behaviours of CYD. Movement behaviours and health of CYD must be prioritized in COVID-19 recovery efforts through quality programming, highly trained instructors, accessible and inclusive infrastructure, and family-centred health.

ПОДХОДЫ К МОДЕЛИРОВАНИЮ ПАССАЖИРОПОТОКОВ В РАМКАХ ФУНКЦИОНИРОВАНИЯ ИНТЕЛЛЕКТУАЛЬНОЙ СИСТЕМЫ УПРАВЛЕНИЯ ГОРОДСКИМИ РЕЛЬСОВЫМИ ТРАНСПОРТНЫМИ СИСТЕМАМИ

The emergence of a large number of transport interchange hubs, changes in megalopolis transport system’s confi guration leads to increasing number of passengers and changing in passenger fl ows using rail transport, which aff ects its functioning and requires consideration when creating and organizing 560 Интеллектуальные системы управления Автоматика на транспорте. № 4, том 7, декабрь 2021 the operation of an intelligent control system for urban rail transport systems. The analysis of the experience in the passenger fl ows study will make it possible to create new algorithms for forecasting passenger traffi c using modern technologies of agent-based modelling and technical vision. The article discusses a parking vehicles model, which allows to consider the factors aff ecting the duration of parking: passenger traffi c, platform unoccupied time, the number of passengers carried, the number of wagons in the train. The article develops structural and mathematical models of passenger fl ows of a transport interchange hub, designed to study the dynamics of an intelligent control system for urban rail transport systems. As an example, when constructing a mathematical model, the interaction of passenger fl ows within the Dmitrovskaya transport-interchange hub was considered, in which there is an intersection of passenger fl ows of three urban rail transport systems: a tramway station, Dmitrovskaya station, which is a station of the Riga direction of Moscow railway and a stopping point of the MCD-2 line of the Moscow Central Diameters, the Dmitrovskaya station of the Moscow Metro.

Studying acoustical capacity and quality of verbal communication in occupied restaurants

Sound level data and occupancy data has been logged in five restaurants by the research team at the University of Nebraska - Lincoln. Sound levels and Occupancy at 10 second intervals were documented over time periods of two to four hours during active business hours. Noise levels were logged with dosimeters distributed throughout each restaurant, and occupancy was obtained from images recorded by infrared cameras. Previous analyses of this data have focused on average sound levels and statistical metrics, such as L10 and L90 values. This presentation focuses on each restaurant's Acoustical Capacity and Quality of Verbal Communication, as introduced by Rindel (2012). Acoustical Capacity is a metric describing the maximum number of persons for reasonable communication in a space, calculated from the unoccupied reverberation time and the volume of the space. Quality of Verbal Communication is a metric describing the ease with which persons in the space can communicate at a singular point in time, depending on the reverberation time, the volume of the space, and the number of occupants in the space.

Evaluation of cooling setpoint setback savings in commercial buildings using electricity and exterior temperature time series data

Commercial buildings account for a significant amount of total energy produced in the US, and the Heating Ventilation and Cooling (HVAC) systems are one of the most significant components of their overall consumption. In this study, we proposed a new data-driven approach to evaluate HVAC cooling systems in commercial buildings and identify savings opportunities. The focus is an investigation of the impact of thermostat setpoint setback but using only whole building, electricity data taken at 15-min intervals for the analysis. We conducted a comparative study of setpoint setback characteristics on 432 commercial buildings with 5 building usage types across the United States. To accomplish this, both piecewise and Random Forest regression algorithms were employed using electricity and exterior temperature datasets to identify operational characteristics and the effective setpoints in the building to determine the corresponding savings opportunities. Both occupied and unoccupied time periods were studied across cooling degree days (CDD), when air conditioning is typically operational. The results show that in commercial buildings, on average, cooling systems account for 9.5% of total consumption. When a one degree setback during the cooling season is applied, an average of approximately 1.1% of annual consumption is achieved; retail and office buildings demonstrate the highest potential for savings. Additionally, we identified that the number of cooling degree days and base to peak ratio (BPR) are the most important variables for predicting the magnitude of the consumption of cooling systems.

Identifying the K-12 classrooms' indoor air quality factors that affect student academic performance

The objective of this study was to investigate associations between indoor air quality (IAQ) in K-12 classrooms and student academic performance. During the academic years 2015–2017, various IAQ factors in 220 classrooms in the US were measured seasonally, excluding summer. Measurements were taken during occupied and unoccupied times in several classrooms within each school. Occupied measurements included indoor carbon dioxide (CO2) and formaldehyde concentrations, and fine and coarse particle counts. Unoccupied measurements consisted of ozone (O3), carbon monoxide (CO), nitrogen dioxide (NO2), and total volatile organic compounds (TVOCs) concentrations. Ventilation rates of classrooms were estimated using measured CO2 concentrations. In addition to IAQ data, classroom aggregated student achievement scores and demographic information were collected from participating school districts. Demographic data included percentage rates of free and reduced lunch recipients (PFRL), high-performance students (PGIF), and special education students (PSPED). A multivariate linear regression analysis was used to investigate the associations between IAQ factors and student scores using demographic data as controls. The results revealed associations between student scores and ventilation system type, ventilation rates, fine particle counts, and O3 and CO concentrations. This research provides valuable information to school districts and design engineers, enabling them to design school environments for improved student performance.

A hybrid access method for broadcasting of safety messages in IEEE 802.11p VANETs

Vehicular Ad-hoc Networks (VANETs) can improve the road safety by transmitting safety-critical messages such as beacons and emergency messages. IEEE 802.11p VANETs have adopted the carrier sense multiple access with collision avoidance (CSMA/CA) mechanism for the multiple access control. The 802.11p media access control (MAC) protocol, however, can not guarantee the reliability of broadcasting data, since the reception of transmitted messages are not acknowledged. Moreover, the backoff scheme of the 802.11p MAC utilizes a fixed-size contention window for safety message broadcasting, which causes high collision probabilities especially in dense environments. In order to improve such drawbacks, we propose a hybrid access method as follows: Nodes are equipped to reserve time slots for the next round of broadcasting, while unoccupied time slots are preserved for those which have emergency needs. In addition, implicit feedbacks are enabled for detecting collisions incurred during random channel accesses in preserved time slots. We devise a mathematical model which optimally controls the parameters of our scheme while minimizes the cost caused by idle channels and collisions. Extensive simulations show that our mechanism can remarkably improve the performance of VANETs in broadcasting of the safety messages.

Hot Off the Press: SGEM #285-Adult Coloring for Anxiety in the Emergency Department.

Hot Off the Press: SGEM #285-Adult Coloring for Anxiety in the Emergency Department.

A Framework for Allocating Server Time to Spot and On-Demand Services in Cloud Computing

Cloud computing delivers value to users by facilitating their access to servers at any time period needed. An approach is to provide both on-demand and spot services on shared servers. The former allows users to access servers on demand at a fixed price and users occupy different time periods on servers. The latter allows users to bid for the remaining unoccupied time periods via dynamic pricing; however, without appropriate design, such time periods may be arbitrarily short since on-demand users arrive randomly. This is also the current service model adopted by Amazon Elastic Cloud Compute. In this article, we provide the first integral framework for sharing time on servers between on-demand and spot services while optimally pricing spot service. It guarantees that on-demand users can get served quickly while spot users can stably use servers for a properly long period once accepted, which is a key feature in making both on-demand and spot services accessible. Simulation results show that, by complementing the on-demand market with a spot market, a cloud provider can improve revenue by up to 461.5%. The framework is designed under assumptions that are met in real environments. It is a new tool that other cloud operators can use to quantify the advantage of a hybrid spot and on-demand service, making the case for eventually integrating this service model into their own infrastructures.

High-Speed Concurrent Transmission Scheme for Full Duplex Multi-Hop Relay Assisted mmWave WPAN Networks

In this paper, we aim to boost the spacial utilization for the millimeter wave (mmWave) based wireless personal area network (WPAN) by developing a high-speed concurrent transmission (HSCT) scheme using full-duplexed multi-hop relay. We approach this task by two phases, i.e., the routing-path developing and multi-flow scheduling phases, respectively. In the first phase, we develop the routing path by taking the multiple high-rate hops into consideration. With the aid of full-duplex relay, using multiple high-rate hops can possibly be more efficient than the low-rate direct transmission. In the second phase, overlapping the scheduling round (SR) can more effectively utilize the full-duplex relay. Conventionally, the SR are arranged in the bumper-to-bumper fashion. Whereas, overlapping the SR can fully utilize the unoccupied time slots. Moreover, to maintain the transmission rate for the paths via multiple high-rate hops, the scheduling algorithm properly arranges concurrent transmissions to avoid intolerable amount of interference. Additionally, the variant prioritized flows are taken into account for designing the routing-path developing and multi-flow scheduling algorithms. The simulation results verify the effectiveness of the proposed HSCT scheme.

Mobile devices in the operating room: Intended and unintended consequences for nurses' work.

This article reports the results of a case study of the consequences of mobile device use for the work practices of operating room nurses. The study identifies different patterns of mobile technology use by operating room nurses, including both work-related and non-work-related use. These patterns have multiple consequences for nurses, such as improvements in information access, e-learning and work-related communication, as well as a perceived increase in distractions from the collaborative work. We conceptualize these consequences in terms of three level effects and explain how we find both positive and negative consequences on the third level. On the positive side, improvements were found in how nurses spent their unoccupied time during the stable parts of operations, contributing to their well-being and job satisfaction. A negative consequence was the perceived increase in distraction from the collaborative operating room work practices.

Thermal building modelling using Gaussian processes

This paper analyzes the suitability of Gaussian processes for thermal building modelling by comparing the day-ahead prediction error of the internal air temperature with a grey-box model. The reference building is a single-zone office with a hydronic heating system, modelled in TRNSYS and simulated during the winter and spring periods. Using the output data of the reference building, the parameters of a Gaussian process and of a physics-based grey-box model are identified, with training periods ranging from three days to six weeks. After three weeks of training, the Gaussian processes achieve 27% lower prediction errors during occupied times compared to the grey-box model. During unoccupied times, however, the Gaussian processes perform consistently worse than the grey-box model. This is due to their large generalization error, especially when faced with untrained ambient temperature values. To reduce the impact of changing weather conditions, adaptive training is applied to the Gaussian processes. When re-training the models every 24h, the prediction error is reduced over 21% during unoccupied times and over 10% during occupied times compared to the non-adaptive training case. These results show that the proposed Gaussian process model can correctly describe a building's thermal dynamics. However, in its current form the model is limited to applications where the prediction during occupied times is more relevant.

Alcohol use among Bhutanese refugees in Nepal

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to explore factors associated with alcohol use disorders (AUDs) among Bhutanese refugees in Nepal, where there has been a mass third-country resettlement operation in place since 2007. Design/methodology/approach – A case-control study was conducted in which the Alcohol Use Disorder Identification Test (AUDIT) was used to confirm AUDs and participants’ eligibility for placement in a case or control group. A translated questionnaire measuring demographic variables and context of drinking was also administered. Findings – In total, 128 questionnaires were completed (32 cases, 96 controls). Compared to participants without AUDs, those with AUDs were more likely to be older (36-50 years) (OR=10.5, 95 per cent CI 2.17-50.81), (50+years) (OR=10.3, 95 per cent CI 2.02-52.71), illiterate (OR=7.3 (2.80-18.42)), use tobacco (smoking or chewing) (OR=4.3 (1.84-10.01)) and be male (OR=3.5 (1.35-8.67)). Reasons for excessive alcohol use included unemployment, unoccupied time and increased family tensions. Originality/value – The study is the first of which the authors are aware that attempts to examine risk factors associated with AUDs within the context of a mass resettlement operation where camp services are winding down. The findings of this study suggest that greater attention needs to be given toward creating meaningful activities for adult, less educated male migrants awaiting resettlement.

Analysis on Scheduling Algorithms of Real-Time Hybrid Tasks

In real-time systems, periodic tasks and aperiodic tasks exist simultaneously. In a uniprocessor system, mainly there are Deferrable Server algorithm (DS) [1], Slack Stealing algorithm (SSA) [2] and their extended version for software/hardware hybrid real-time task scheduling. DS algorithm sets a high priority periodic task server to provide services for aperiodic tasks, while SSA algorithm computes tasks unoccupied time offline, and then schedule aperiodic tasks during the unoccupied period. The two algorithms are both proposed for soft real-time tasks, reducing the response time of the real-time tasks, but cannot guarantee that these aperiodic real-time tasks received can meet deadlines. In this paper, through combination of DS algorithm and EDF (Earliest Deadline First) algorithm [6], a new algorithm called DS-EDF is introduced, which can scheduling hard real-time aperiodic tasks on the DS server. This algorithm is not only suitable for uniprocessor systems, but also has the ability to extend to multiprocessor systems.

Resource-sharing between internal maintenance and external selection modulates attentional capture by working memory content.

It is unclear why and under what circumstances working memory (WM) and attention interact. Here, we apply the logic of the time-based resource-sharing (TBRS) model of WM (e.g., Barrouillet et al., 2004) to explore the mixed findings of a separate, but related, literature that studies the guidance of visual attention by WM contents. Specifically, we hypothesize that the linkage between WM representations and visual attention is governed by a time-shared cognitive resource that alternately refreshes internal (WM) and selects external (visual attention) information. If this were the case, WM content should guide visual attention (involuntarily), but only when there is time for it to be refreshed in an internal focus of attention. To provide an initial test for this hypothesis, we examined whether the amount of unoccupied time during a WM delay could impact the magnitude of attentional capture by WM contents. Participants were presented with a series of visual search trials while they maintained a WM cue for a delayed-recognition test. WM cues could coincide with the search target, a distracter, or neither. We varied both the number of searches to be performed, and the amount of available time to perform them. Slowing of visual search by a WM matching distracter—and facilitation by a matching target—were curtailed when the delay was filled with fast-paced (refreshing-preventing) search trials, as was subsequent memory probe accuracy. WM content may, therefore, only capture visual attention when it can be refreshed, suggesting that internal (WM) and external attention demands reciprocally impact one another because they share a limited resource. The TBRS rationale can thus be applied in a novel context to explain why WM contents capture attention, and under what conditions that effect should be observed.

Congestion-Controlled-Coordinator-Based MAC for Safety-Critical Message Transmission in VANETs

Vehicular ad hoc networks (VANETs) provide the communication framework for the dissemination of safety-critical messages such as beacons and emergency messages. The communication channel witnesses significant network load generated by frequently exchanged beacons. Under high-density situations, it leads to a serious scalability problem in VANETs. Moreover, contention-based medium access control (MAC) protocols suffer from a great number of packet collisions, and as a result, the reliability and latency of safety messages are severely affected. Because of the periodic nature of beacons, time-division multiple access (TDMA) can be a good choice over contention-based MAC. In this paper, we propose congestion-controlled-coordinator-based MAC (CCC-MAC), which is a time-slot-based medium access protocol that addresses beacons and emergency messages. Basically, the network is virtually partitioned into a number of segments. Within a segment, medium access is accomplished by using a time-slot-scheduling mechanism supervised by a local coordinator vehicle. A significant number of vehicles can be supported under the proposed configuration. In fact, the proposed scheduling mitigates channel congestion by reducing the transmission time of beacons through the use of multiple data rates. Bandwidth utilization is also improved by reusing the unoccupied time slots. Finally, CCC-MAC ensures fast and reliable propagation of emergency messages by employing a pulse-based reservation mechanism. In the simulations, we demonstrate the ability of CCC-MAC to scale well in different vehicular density scenarios. Moreover, it outperforms existing MAC-layer protocols with respect to packet reception probability and latency of safety messages.