Technology requirements,and social impacts of technology for at-scale coral reef restoration

The coral reefs of the world are in decline as a result of local and global stressors. Significant impacts are caused by ocean heat waves associated with increasing ocean temperatures as the oceans accommodate more and more of the heat produced as a result of the global emissions of greenhouse gases. In response, a global reef restoration sector is emerging with the aspiration to restore many of the worlds' reefs and increase their resilience to climate change and other stressors. However, the scale of the challenge is vast, and will realistically only be achieved through the development and application of new marine technology including for environmental surveillance and monitoring, material transfer (corals and coral rubble), new more resilient varieties of corals and the underpinning required data analytics. In addition, most reefs are located in low-income nations, including Small Island Nations and the level of complexity and ease of use of technologies being developed will dictate who can participate in at-scale restoration of the world's reefs, and correspondingly may lead to considerable social distributional impacts as some communities will be able to utilise emerging technologies whilst others may not.     

The regulation of technology,and the technology of regulation

Regulation may inhibit or stimulate technological change. The relationship depends on the technology of regulation—the design and instrument choice of regulatory policy. This essay examines the history of economic and social regulations over the last three decades, the explanatory power of theories of regulatory politics, the choice of regulatory instruments, the assessment of regulatory impacts, and the influence of each of these on the innovation and diffusion of technology (and of regulation). It concludes with recommendations for the future of regulation and technology.     

The proximate determinants of fertility

The proximate determinants of fertility are the biological and behavioral factors through which socioeconomic and environmental variables operate to influence the rate of childbearing in a population. Three biological proximate variables are identified: permanent sterility, the probability of conception, and intrauterine mortality. Although these variables lower the actual rate of reproduction to far below its potential maximum, they contribute little to trends in fertility. Changes over time in fertility are largely due to changes in the behavioral proximate determinants. The most important of these is the prevalence of contraceptive use, but the duration of breastfeeding, the practice of induced abortion, patterns of union formation, and contraceptive effectiveness are or have been major determinants of levels and trends in fertility in most societies.     

Bridging corporate social responsibility and social impact assessment

Corporate social responsibility (CSR) and social impact assessment (SIA) share foundational values. Yet even where a single corporation espouses CSR and carries out SIA, the two often pass like ships in the night. Drawing upon recent literature and experiences from a decade of applied social research in CSR and SIA in the resources industry, this professional practice paper identifies three key bridging points through which CSR and SIA could be better linked and strengthened in future: policy–practice gaps, voluntary versus involuntary regulation and internal versus independent implementation.     

Buy-in and social capital: by-products of social impact assessment

Participatory impact assessment is a term frequently used and often abused. It refers to an approach that includes interested and affected parties in deciding indicators and measures of environmental and social impacts, in evaluation of effects and monitoring. Involving communities in a participatory manner facilitates skill transfer, fosters buy-in and creates local social capital. This paper describes a participatory exercise initiated by a local authority (Council) in New Zealand. Based on the reported assessment and that of two others, five essential ingredients are identified for a genuine participatory exercise. Time and flexibility are key components.     

人流不全的临床特点分析及生育情况调查

目的:分析人流不全的临床特点,探讨其发生的高危因素,同时调查患者术后的生育及避孕情况。方法:对首都医科大学附属北京妇产医院2007年10月—2012年10月收治的55例人流不全病历进行回顾性病例分析以及电话随访了解其生育情况及避孕情况。结果:人流不全的主要临床表现为人流术后的异常阴道出血42例(42/55,76.4%)以及月经异常13例(13/55,23.6%),超声检查可以发现人流不全造成的宫腔内异常,但需要结合人绒毛膜促性腺激素(HCG)水平的测定以及术后的病理来诊断人流不全。B超下的清宫手术能有效地清除残留的妊娠组织,术后均未再发现宫腔残留。人流不全的高危因素中主要的客观因素为子宫过度屈曲,占23.6%(13/55),主要的主观因素为宫颈扩张不够,占25.5%(14/55)。二次清宫术后主要并发症为宫腔粘连,发生率为5.5%(3/55)。55例患者术后共随访到29例患者,有17例再次妊娠,其中11例妊娠分娩,6例选择人工流产终止妊娠,未发现人流不全二次清宫对生育的明显不良影响。无生育要求的妇女均有意识采取避孕方法来避免意外妊娠。结论:人流不全的主要临床表现为手术后异常的阴道出血,通过结合尿或血的HCG检查以及B超检查,可以及时地发现人流不全。超声指导下清宫是治疗的有效办法。人流不全发生的高危因素,主要客观因素为子宫过度屈曲,主要主观因素为宫颈扩张不够。对于存在高危因素的手术采取超声指示下手术,能够有效地降低人流不全的发生率。人流不全二次清宫术后主要手术并发症为宫腔粘连,无手术并发症发生的患者,未发现明显生育能力的受损。但是对于避孕方法的选择,还需要更多的计划生育服务来帮助她们采取高效的避孕方法。     

The cognitive and the social structure of STS

Scientometrics - The differentiation of scientific fields into sub-fields can be studiedon the level of the 'scientific content' of the sub-field, thatis on the level of the products, as...     

Rasch modeling and the measurement of social participation

Social participation is the main outcome of physical rehabilitation programs. The aim of this study is to improve the measurement of social participation, using an instrument called the Assessment of Life Habits Scale and the Rasch model. The interval level measurement, the dimensionality and the generalizability of the item hierarchy were verified. The data from a large sample of people with spinal cord injury was analyzed and specific results were compared with expert opinions. The main properties of the instrument were satisfactory and the agreement with expert opinion was high. Principal component analysis showed multidimensionality. The item difficulty hierarchy obtained with spinal cord injury experts was different from the one obtained with traumatic brain injury experts, indicating a different difficulty level of items in relation to each population characteristics. We conclude that the instrument is appropriate for the measurement of social participation and suggest ways to improve the instrument.     

Profiling institutes: Identifying high research performance and social relevance in the social and behavioral sciences

This study focuses on the identification of high output research and high impact research in the social and behavioral sciences. A second objective is to monitor developments in research that is related to societal needs and problems. For each topic, we identify institutes and authors that have contributed a considerable number of SSCI articles and/or several (relatively) highly cited articles on a topic. To identify papers with a (relatively) high impact, the present study used two citation thresholds, each based upon a combination of a statistically determined minimum number of ‘external’ citations (by others than the authors of a paper), and a statistical comparison with world average citation levels. Topics were categorised according to social relevance. Detailed profiles of both large and small institutes are obtained, showing strengths and weaknesses in research performance that tend to be obscured by standard indicators focusing on ‘average’ research performance. Socially relevant topics tend to be concentrated in multidisciplinary clusters, whereas clusters dominated by one or two disciplines contain more basis research. The results provide a first insight in the extent to which institutes and authors address socially relevant topics. Use of the results by policy bodies seems dependent upon which organisational level of research they tend to address.     

Evaluating the relationship between the academic and social impact of open access books based on citation behaviors and social media attention

Scientometrics - Open access academic achievements include not only papers and journals, but also books, which have become an important achievement for scholars and can be regarded as scholarly...     

The effect of social balance on social fragmentation

With the availability of internet, social media, etc., the interconnectedness of people within most societies has increased tremendously over the past decades. Across the same timespan, an increasing level of fragmentation of society into small isolated groups has been observed. With a simple model of a society, in which the dynamics of individual opinion formation is integrated with social balance, we show that these two phenomena might be tightly related. We identify a critical level of interconnectedness, above which society fragments into sub-communities that are internally cohesive and hostile towards other groups. This critical communication density necessarily exists in the presence of social balance, and arises from the underlying mathematical structure of a phase transition known from the theory of disordered magnets called spin glasses. We discuss the consequences of this phase transition for social fragmentation in society.     

The mediating role of problematic social media use in the relationship between social avoidance/distress and self-esteem

The number of social media users in Bangladesh is increasing in every year. Young people – mainly college and university students – are the heavy users of it. Problematic social media use (PSMU) has received increasing research attention over the past decade. However, there are very few studies concerning PSMU in Bangladesh. The present study examined the role of PSMU in the relationship between social avoidance/distress and self-esteem. The study comprised a sample of 370 university students from the University of Chittagong (Bangladesh). Participants were administered a survey including questions regarding socio-demographics, the Bergen Social Media Addiction Scale (BSMAS), the Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale (RSES), and the Social Avoidance and Distress Scale (SADS). Results showed that PSMU partially mediated the relationship between social avoidance/distress and self-esteem, while social avoidance/distress predicted the level of self-esteem. However, PSMU had a non-significant influence on the relationship between these two variables while self-esteem predicted social avoidance/distress.     

Strengthening the regulation of clinical trials and bioresearch monitoring

The Food and Drug Administration has announced new policy and regulatory developments to strengthen the agency's oversight and protection of patients in clinical trials and the integrity of resulting data. The Human Subject Protection and Bioresearch Monitoring (HSP/BIMO) initiative will help modernize the agency's approach to bioresearch monitoring of devices, foods, human drugs, biological drug products, and veterinary medicine.     

China社会福利制度的发展中国

先秦儒家提出了“使老有所终”、“矜寡孤独废疾者,皆有所养”（《礼记·礼运》）等思想和主张,对中国福利思想的产生有积极影响。
　　清朝末年发生的资产阶级改良主义的维新运动,宣扬西方资产阶级自由、平等、博爱、民权的进步思想,西方的福利思想和福利主张开始在中国传播。     

Penetrating the fog of technology's social dimensions

This study offers a straightforward message: To gain a meaningful understanding of technology's societal connection, one must first dismantle the intricate complexity that often envelops today's technological enterprises. Growth analysis represents a heuristic device, suitable for setting aside the peripheral and enabling the analyst to focus on key points. In effect, growth analysis sees beyond complexity to grasp the essential points and, in the process, makes the subject under investigation simpler and, therefore, more manageable.     

纳米技术及其对科技产业革命的影响

2000年2月美国制定了“国家纳米技术战略”,引起世界各国的巨大反响,日本、欧洲的工业先进国家先后制定了纳米技术发展规划,纳米科技这一崭新的前沿学科,被视为新一轮材料革命的核心,在航空航天领域将产生重大影响。文章综述了纳米技术的概念、纳米材料及纳米技术的研究情况。     

Impact of sharing full versus averaged social information on social influence and estimation accuracy

The recent developments of social networks and recommender systems have dramatically increased the amount of social information shared in human communities, challenging the human ability to process it. As a result, sharing aggregated forms of social information is becoming increasingly popular. However, it is unknown whether sharing aggregated information improves people’s judgments more than sharing the full available information. Here, we compare the performance of groups in estimation tasks when social information is fully shared versus when it is first averaged and then shared. We find that improvements in estimation accuracy are comparable in both cases. However, our results reveal important differences in subjects’ behaviour: (i) subjects follow the social information more when receiving an average than when receiving all estimates, and this effect increases with the number of estimates underlying the average; (ii) subjects follow the social information more when it is higher than their personal estimate than when it is lower. This effect is stronger when receiving all estimates than when receiving an average. We introduce a model that sheds light on these effects, and confirms their importance for explaining improvements in estimation accuracy in all treatments.     

Quorum sensing and social networking in the microbial world

For many years, bacterial cells were considered primarily as selfish individuals, but, in recent years, it has become evident that, far from operating in isolation, they coordinate collective behaviour in response to environmental challenges using sophisticated intercellular communication networks. Cell-to-cell communication between bacteria is mediated by small diffusible signal molecules that trigger changes in gene expression in response to fluctuations in population density. This process, generally referred to as quorum sensing (QS), controls diverse phenotypes in numerous Gram-positive and Gram-negative bacteria. Recent advances have revealed that bacteria are not limited to communication within their own species but are capable of ‘listening in’ and ‘broadcasting to’ unrelated species to intercept messages and coerce cohabitants into behavioural modifications, either for the good of the population or for the benefit of one species over another. It is also evident that QS is not limited to the bacterial kingdom. The study of two-way intercellular signalling networks between bacteria and both uni- and multicellular eukaryotes as well as between eukaryotes is just beginning to unveil a rich diversity of communication pathways.