Population growth, arable land and fresh water limits, and climate change have profound implications for the ability of agriculture to meet this century's demands for food, feed, fiber, and fuel ...while reducing the environmental impact of their production. Success depends on the acceptance and use of contemporary molecular techniques, as well as the increasing development of farming systems that use saline water and integrate nutrient flows.
Twenty-nine teams involving 61 analysts used the same data set to address the same research question: whether soccer referees are more likely to give red cards to dark-skin-toned players than to ...light-skin-toned players. Analytic approaches varied widely across the teams, and the estimated effect sizes ranged from 0.89 to 2.93 (Mdn = 1.31) in odds-ratio units. Twenty teams (69%) found a statistically significant positive effect, and 9 teams (31%) did not observe a significant relationship. Overall, the 29 different analyses used 21 unique combinations of covariates. Neither analysts’ prior beliefs about the effect of interest nor their level of expertise readily explained the variation in the outcomes of the analyses. Peer ratings of the quality of the analyses also did not account for the variability. These findings suggest that significant variation in the results of analyses of complex data may be difficult to avoid, even by experts with honest intentions. Crowdsourcing data analysis, a strategy in which numerous research teams are recruited to simultaneously investigate the same research question, makes transparent how defensible, yet subjective, analytic choices influence research results.
Finding "Meaning" in Psychology Molden, Daniel C; Dweck, Carol S
The American psychologist,
04/2006, Letnik:
61, Številka:
3
Journal Article
Recenzirano
Much of psychology focuses on universal principles of thought and action. Although an extremely productive pursuit, this approach, by describing only the "average person," risks describing no one in ...particular. This article discusses an alternate approach that complements interests in universal principles with analyses of the unique psychological meaning that individuals find in their experiences and interactions. Rooted in research on social cognition, this approach examines how people's lay theories about the stability or malleability of human attributes alter the meaning they give to basic psychological processes such as self-regulation and social perception. Following a review of research on this lay theories perspective in the field of social psychology, the implications of analyzing psychological meaning for other fields such as developmental, cultural, and personality psychology are discussed.
► We applied water accounting to estimate water saving potential. ► We use water budgeting to estimate water depletions. ► Increasing non-beneficial depletions reflects needs for new water ...management. ► Water savings are raised if water banking in subsurface aquifers is applied.
The Syrdarya River basin in Central Asia exhibits symptoms of scarcity because of growing competition between hydropower upstream and environment, cities and agriculture downstream. Different approaches to water management, based on water savings in agriculture could relieve the stress of competition, yet keep alive a vibrant agriculture. The Fergana Valley, a highly productive area within the upstream of the Syrdarya River, was analyzed to determine the water savings potential of agriculture. This paper used a water accounting procedure to identify both the scope for savings and the strategies to realize those gains. Significant nonproductive depletion of water at 2681–4164millionm3 (Mm3) was identified in the form of evaporation, flows to sinks and pollution. The water-saving potential is estimated at 2823Mm3 annually, which is about 10% of the total inflow into the area, through a range of practical approaches. This strategy would bring regional benefits by reallocation of surplus winter flow from the upstream for summer use in the downstream.
Five studies examined hypothesis generation and discounting in causal attribution from the perspective of regulatory focus theory (
E. T. Higgins, 1997
,
1998
). According to this theory, a promotion ...focus is associated with generating more and simultaneously endorsing multiple hypotheses, whereas a prevention focus is associated with generating only a few hypotheses and selecting 1 hypothesis from a given set. Five studies confirmed these predictions for both situationally induced and chronic individual differences in regulatory focus. In Studies 1, 2, and 3, individuals in a promotion focus generated more hypotheses than individuals in a prevention focus. In Studies 4 and 5, individuals in a promotion focus discounted explanations in light of alternatives less than individuals in a prevention focus. Study 5 also found that in a promotion focus, person explanations were generalized across situations less than in a prevention focus.
In the present study, NDVI time-series 10-day composites derived from NOAA AVHRR data were used to estimate bimodal agriculture areas (where there are two seasons of cultivation per annum) using ...Fourier approach. The NDVI sequence was transformed into harmonic signals and the amplitude and phase of first and second harmonics were used for the analysis. A classification was applied, using a decision tree, to discriminate bimodal agriculture area from other land cover types, principally over the Asian sub-region. When the amplitude of second harmonics in a sample region, where bimodal agriculture is predominant, was compared with the irrigated area statistics developed by FAO-UF, a linear relationship was determined. The derived function was applied to transform the amplitude of second harmonics to bimodal agriculture area estimates. Thus large-scale irrigation projects appear on the map and provide an encouraging initial result. This result indicates that estimating bimodal agriculture area that is one of the main sources of information for irrigated area mapping at regional or global scale, with improved accuracy possible if greater spatial, temporal resolution is achieved, for instance from MODIS or SPOT vegetation time series NDVI data, combined with (1) an improved decision tree classification algorithm and (2) a greater precision and geographical distribution of ground-truth data. The principle merits of this approach are automation and repeatability.
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