Accelerating transition to virtual research organisation in social science (AVROSS) : final report

This report is the fourth deliverable of the AVROSS study (Accelerating Transition to Virtual Research Organisation in Social Science, AVROSS). The study aims were to identify the requirements and options for accelerating the transition from traditional research to virtual research organisations through e-Infrastructures. The reason for this focus is that it is clear that "soft" sciences have both much to gain and a key role to play in promoting e-Infrastructure uptake across the disciplines, but to date have not been the fastest adopters of advanced grid-based e-Infrastructure. Our recommendations to EU policy-makers can be expected to point the way to changing this situation, promoting e-Infrastructure in Europe in these disciplines, with clear requirements to developers and expected impact in several other disciplines with related requirements, such as e-Health

How does water-reliant industry affect groundwater systems in coastal Kenya?

The industrialization process taking place in Africa has led to an overall increase in groundwater abstraction in most countries in the continent. However, the lack of hydrogeological data, as in many developing countries, makes it difficult to properly manage groundwater systems. This study presents a real case study in which a combination of different hydrogeological tools together with different sources of information allow the assessment of how increased competition for water may be affecting groundwater systems by analysing the sustainability of new abstraction regimes under different real climatic condition (before, during and after La Niña 2016). The area where this approach has been applied is Kwale County (in Coastal Kenya) in a hydrogeological context representative of an important part of the east coast of the continent, where new mining and agriculture activities co-exist with tourism and local communities. The results show that the lack of aquifer systems data can be overcome, at least partly, by integrating different sources of information. Most of the time, water-reliant users collect specific hydrogeological information that can contribute to defining the overall hydrogeological system, since their own main purpose is to exploit the aquifer with the maximum productivity. Therefore, local community water usage, together with different stakeholder's knowledge and good corporate water management act as a catalyst for providing critical data, and allows the generation of credible models for future groundwater management and resource allocation. Furthermore, complementary but simple information sources such as in situ interviews, Google Earth, Trip Advisor and easy-to use analytical methods that can be applied in the African context as in many developing countries, and enables groundwater abstraction to be estimated and the sustainability of the aquifer system to be defined, allowing potential future risks to be assessed.Peer ReviewedPostprint (published version

Innocent strategies as presheaves and interactive equivalences for CCS

Seeking a general framework for reasoning about and comparing programming languages, we derive a new view of Milner's CCS. We construct a category E of plays, and a subcategory V of views. We argue that presheaves on V adequately represent innocent strategies, in the sense of game semantics. We then equip innocent strategies with a simple notion of interaction. This results in an interpretation of CCS. Based on this, we propose a notion of interactive equivalence for innocent strategies, which is close in spirit to Beffara's interpretation of testing equivalences in concurrency theory. In this framework we prove that the analogues of fair and must testing equivalences coincide, while they differ in the standard setting.Comment: In Proceedings ICE 2011, arXiv:1108.014

Models of everywhere revisited: a technological perspective

The concept ‘models of everywhere’ was first introduced in the mid 2000s as a means of reasoning about the environmental science of a place, changing the nature of the underlying modelling process, from one in which general model structures are used to one in which modelling becomes a learning process about specific places, in particular capturing the idiosyncrasies of that place. At one level, this is a straightforward concept, but at another it is a rich multi-dimensional conceptual framework involving the following key dimensions: models of everywhere, models of everything and models at all times, being constantly re-evaluated against the most current evidence. This is a compelling approach with the potential to deal with epistemic uncertainties and nonlinearities. However, the approach has, as yet, not been fully utilised or explored. This paper examines the concept of models of everywhere in the light of recent advances in technology. The paper argues that, when first proposed, technology was a limiting factor but now, with advances in areas such as Internet of Things, cloud computing and data analytics, many of the barriers have been alleviated. Consequently, it is timely to look again at the concept of models of everywhere in practical conditions as part of a trans-disciplinary effort to tackle the remaining research questions. The paper concludes by identifying the key elements of a research agenda that should underpin such experimentation and deployment

Bread baking, food growing, and bicycle riding:practice memories and household consumption during the COVID-19 lockdowns in Melbourne

This article explores the COVID-19 pandemic as an external “shock” that changed household-consumption practices in Melbourne, Australia. We assess national consumption data and retail data for the state of Victoria to show how dramatically consumption patterns shifted during 2020. We then discuss three specific examples of changed consumption practices during the pandemic drawn from an analysis of media reports: bread baking, food growing, and bicycle riding. These activities illustrate how the pandemic and resultant lockdowns enabled innovation in domestic consumption, enhanced food security and resilience, and created space for the experience of a slower way of life. We argue that the pandemic provided impetus to experiment and innovate in ways that are relevant to sustainability but not necessarily motivated by it. Further, there is limited evidence that sustainable consumption practices will live on at an integrated mass scale, given a lack of wider institutional effects, such as changes in policy, business strategy, or mass social movements to support them. Instead, we hypothesize that these new consumption experiences “discovered” during the lockdown will live on as practice memories that might be mobilized when the next shock comes.</p

Household niche experimentation in sustainability transitions and everyday life:a novel framework with evidence from low-waste living in Melbourne

Sustainability transitions research and policy treat households and the home in a narrow way. The paper reviews niche-based experimentation and social-practice theory informed sustainability transitions literature to develop a novel framework for deliberate household experimentation. The usefulness of the framework is explored in an action research project on low-waste living in Melbourne. Data was collected through interviews, weekly self-reports and three participatory workshops. The research confirms the usefulness of the framework and offers reflections on deliberate household experimentation. The conclusion is that similar to other niche spaces, household niches are instrumental in demonstrating, learning about, advocating for and critiquing different aspects of sustainability transitions. But in contrast to other niche spaces, households are deeply embedded in the everyday life of what matters to people. If the transition to low-waste living is to be successful, it needs to be planned from the perspective of everyday household life.</p

Role of local governments and households in low-waste city transitions

Local governments are placing greater requirements on households to sort and reduce their waste. The research draws on experimental governance scholarship to explore the transformative capacity of local government in low waste sustainability transitions and how this is given form through engaging households in new waste management initiatives. Australia, a high-income county with one of the highest per-capita rates of waste generation globally, faces significant challenges for low waste city transitions. We conducted a desktop review of local government waste initiatives across Melbourne, Adelaide and Brisbane, and recorded interviews with nine waste managers. While the traditional service provider role remains important, municipalities are introducing new ways of addressing the waste problem that rely on actions by other parties, including households. Roles of promoter, enabler and partner are employed to experiment with new initiatives. The promoter role is an important initial stage, but the enabler and partner roles have most potential to orchestrate households as active innovation and change agents in low waste transitions and contribute to broader shifts in social norms and practices.</p

Emotion and peer problems in autistic adolescents: The role of puberty, school adjustment and bullying

Background Emotion and peer problems tend to increase in autistic young people during adolescence. However, the extent to which endogenous (e.g., pubertal maturation) and exogenous (e.g., school adjustment, bullying) factors contribute to trajectories of emotion and peer problems in autistic young people is unclear. Methods Using data from the Millennium Cohort Study (MCS), we fitted latent growth curves to model initial levels and growth in emotion and peer problems during adolescence. We used generalised structural equation models to investigate whether pubertal maturation, school adjustment, bullying, and timing of autism diagnosis (none, early [&lt;8 years] or late [≥8 years]) predict initial levels and growth of emotion and peer problems in autistic and non‐autistic young people, separately for males (n = 780) and females (n = 172). Results In females, there were significant interactions between timing of diagnosis and (a) school adjustment and (b) bullying. In females with a late diagnosis of autism, lower school adjustment and greater bullying were associated with greater growth of emotion problems during adolescence. Furthermore, in females with an early diagnosis, lower school adjustment was associated with greater initial levels of peer problems. In males, later pubertal maturation was associated with greater growth of emotion and peer problems during adolescence, irrespective of autism diagnosis. In males with an early diagnosis of autism, greater bullying was associated with greater growth of emotion problems during adolescence. Conclusion School adjustment and bullying were associated with increasing emotion and peer problems in autistic adolescents, but their relative contribution varied according to timing of autism diagnosis and sex. Overall, this study supports the need for early identification and intervention for young autistic people experiencing poor school adjustment and bullying during adolescence

NudgeAlong: A Case-Based Approach to Changing User Behaviour

Companies want to change the way that users interact with their services. One of the main ways to do this is through messaging. It is well known that different users are likely to respond to different types of messages. Targeting the right message type at the right user is key to achieving successful behaviour change. This paper frames this as a case based reasoning problem. The case representation captures a summary of a user’s interactions with a company’s services over time. The case solution represents a message type that resulted in a desired change in the user’s behaviour. This paper describes this framework, how it has been tested using simulation and a short description of a test deployment

Households in sustainability transitions:a systematic review and new research avenues

This paper explores conceptualisations of households in sustainability transitions. Existing literature in the field has only engaged with households in a limited and fragmented way, despite the role of households in resource use, shaping social innovation and as a target of environmental policies. The paper asks: how are households conceptualised in sustainability transitions and how could this be further developed in future research? The paper uses systematic review to explore how the literature currently engages with households. We find two overarching approaches to households: a closed-box approach and an open-box approach. The closed-box approach engages households as a fixed unit of analysis, without attention to internal dynamics and how these may interact with system-level changes, whereas the open-box approach unpacks the household as a dynamic social unit and material setting in the context of multiple scales and other social units. Both approaches are further discussed in terms of how they engage with households as users, sites and sources. Based on the analysis, the paper proposes a comprehensive definition of households in transition studies, and identifies four areas for future research in sustainability transitions: households' and householders’ agency; unpacking household dynamics; household innovation across scales and socio-technical systems; and households in policy and governance.</p