China’s segregated school system hinders migrants

Book Announcement

CORNELL UNIVERSITY

ITHACA, N.Y. -- 

When Eli Friedman set out to write his second book, he intended to focus on the segregated education system in China and how it affected teachers’ work, but quickly found that the project moved in an unexpected direction.

“When I started talking to teachers about their work, it just brought up so many other problems,” said Friedman, associate professor and chair of international and comparative labor in the ILR School. “They talked about normal workplace concerns around wages and working hours, but also the bigger problems that really had to do with a broader social environment and the fact that the government was taking all of these steps to make their lives extremely difficult – both the teachers and the families that they were serving.”

“The Urbanization of People,” to be released in May by the Columbia University Press, reveals how cities in China have granted public goods to the privileged while condemning poor and working-class migrants to insecurity, constant mobility and degraded educational opportunities.

“In China, the public schools are the good schools and the private schools are the bad ones,” Friedman said. “For people excluded from public schools, there is a shadow education system – private schools that receive little or no money from the government. They are totally dependent on tuition, but they serve a poor population, so they operate under unbelievably tight financial constraints.”

Using the schools as a backdrop, Friedman investigates how the state manages flows of people into the city, often by limiting educational opportunities to the children of “migrants” – rural Chinese that move to the large cities for better work opportunities. There are now nearly 300 million such migrants in China who are living outside of their place of official registration, which means they can be denied access to social services.

“In 2014, the government established this ‘population redline’ of 23 million for Beijing and basically told local government officials that they need to find ways of getting rid of some of the ‘less desirable’ people in the cities,” said Friedman. “And they used all kinds of mechanisms, including relocating labor-intensive industries outside of the city, demolishing whole informal settlements, but also demolishing or closing the schools and making it harder for the children of people who are from rural areas to get into public schools within the city and thereby believing, correctly I think, that if the children can’t get into schools, the parents will have to leave.”

Friedman conducted roughly 250 interviews with teachers and migrants in Beijing, as well as in the city of Guangzhou in the south, the city of Guiyang in the southwest, and the city of Chengdu in the western part of the country.

Through his research, Friedman found that when private schools shut down, migrant parents are left in a precarious position. If the parents are lucky, they might find another neighborhood school to take their children. The other options are to move somewhere else – which can affect their work – or to send the children back to the rural area to live with extended family – which has created the phenomenon of nearly 60 million “left behind children” who are living without their parents.

“You set up your life in a particular way and need it to continue that way,” Friedman said. “And if one of legs of that table falls, then everything can collapse.”

Friedman’s first book, “Insurgency Trap: Labor Politics in Postsocialist China,” published in 2014, explored Chinese state-labor relations. Through that book, he first began to hear the concerns of migrant parents.

“In talking to a lot of migrant workers for my first project, their biggest concerns were often not what was happening in the workplace, but about getting their kids into school,” Friedman said. “If you have kids, in order for your life to feel stabilized, you need a job and you need enough money to pay the rent, but you also need to feel like your kids have a future in the place that you live. So oftentimes, education was their bigger concern.

“The migrant workers that are the thread that connects these two projects.”

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Mental illness plays havoc with the mind as well as the heart

Peer-Reviewed Publication

UNIVERSITY OF SOUTH AUSTRALIA

University of South Australia scientists have uncovered another reason why society should be paying more attention to mental health: it is closely aligned to blood pressure and heart rate variations.

A new study published in BioMedical Engineering draws a link between mental illness and widely fluctuating blood pressure, which can lead to cardiovascular disease and organ damage.

UniSA researcher Dr Renly Lim and colleagues from Malaysian universities say there is clear evidence that mental illness interferes with the body’s autonomic functions, including blood pressure, heart rate, temperature and breathing.

“We reviewed 12 studies on people with anxiety, depression and panic disorders and found that, regardless of age, mental illness is significantly associated with greater blood pressure variations during the day,” Dr Lim says.

“We also found that for people who are mentally ill, their heart rate does not adapt to external stressors as it should.

“Contrary to what many people think, a healthy heart is not one that beats like a metronome. Instead, it should adjust to withstand environmental and psychological challenges. A constantly changing heart rate is actually a sign of good health.”

Reduced heart rate variation (HRV) is common in people with mental illness and indicates that the body’s stress response is poor, exacerbating the negative effects of chronic stress.

Unlike a person’s heart rate – how many times a heart beats in a minute – which is usually consistent, HRV is more complex and is the time between two heartbeats, which should change according to external stressors.

“What we aim for is not a constantly changing heart rate but a high heart rate variation. This is achieved through a healthy diet, exercise, low stress and good mental health.”

Low HRV occurs when a person’s body is in fight-or-flight mode, easily stressed and common in people with chronic diseases, including cardiovascular and mental health problems.

While large blood pressure variations (BPV) during the day are not ideal, at night the systolic pressure should dip by between 10-20 per cent to allow the heart to rest. The researchers found that in people with mental health issues, their blood pressure does not drop sufficiently at night.

The reduced dipping – under 10 per cent – can be caused by many factors, including autonomic dysfunction, poor quality of sleep and disrupted circadian rhythms that regulate the sleep-wake cycle.

“The takeout from this study is that we need to pay more attention to the physical impacts of mental illness,” Dr Lim says.

“It is a major global burden, affecting between 11-18 per cent (one billion) of people worldwide. Since mental illness can contribute to the deterioration of heart and blood pressure regulation, early therapeutic intervention is essential.”

 

Notes for editors

“Association between mental illness and blood pressure variability: a systematic review” is published in BioMedical Engineering. For a copy of the paper, email candy.gibson@unisa.edu.au

The research was undertaken at the University of Malaya, University of South Australia, Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia, and Universiti Tunku Abdul Rahman.

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JOURNAL

BioMedical Engineering OnLine

DOI

10.1186/s12938-022-00985-w 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Meta-analysis

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

People

ARTICLE TITLE

Association between mental illness and blood pressure variability: a systematic review

How can mental health professionals open their minds to psychosis?

(READ R D LAING'S MICROACID SESSIONS WITH PATIENTS)

Peer-Reviewed Publication

UNIVERSITY OF BIRMINGHAM

Effective clinical care for patients with psychosis means understanding the ‘lived experience’ of their delusions, say researchers at the Universities of Birmingham, York and Melbourne.

By understanding the intricacies of feelings, attitudes, and experiences which are interlinked with delusions, clinicians will be better able to build trust and genuine engagement with patients.

In a new study, published today (4 May 2022) in The Lancet Psychiatry, researchers collated and reviewed first-hand accounts of the experience of delusions from patients with psychosis in mental health settings. In their review, the team used a new methodological approach informed by philosophy to combine and synthesis all the available qualitative evidence. The team then developed a new model to better understand how delusions emerge and are shaped by different contexts from multiple levels of explanation.

The authors examined the experiences of more than 370 patients, described in 24 different scientific studies and found a number of themes that were common across all the studies.

For most participants, for example, delusions were not just a symptom of illness or an irrational belief. Delusions often were the most compelling way that the person could make sense of their life, in the context of a radical alteration of reality and intense emotions. While the experience could be hostile, sparking fear or panic, individuals could also experience awe or wonder, or deep meaning in their delusions.

When reality is altered in this way, individuals can struggle to make sense of their own identity, experiencing self-doubt or a loss of control or, conversely, the feeling that they are someone special, or with a unique purpose. In the latter case, the delusional experience seemed to provide a sense of coherence, purpose and belonging at a time of intense life stress and can therefore be interpreted as temporarily adaptive or beneficial.

“These experiences are complex and nuanced,” said lead author Dr Rosa Ritunnano, consultant psychiatrist and researcher at the University of Birmingham’s Institute for Mental Health and the University of Melbourne. “When we train clinicians in treating psychosis, we need to ensure they are going beyond ‘correcting’ a dysfunction or ‘curing’ a symptom. Instead, by trying to understand how the delusion is shaped by the patient’s emotions, life experiences and socio-cultural contexts, we can devise treatment and support that is more relevant to the individual.”

The approach has particular resonance for situations in which a patient may be detained without their consent with the aim of protecting themselves from harm. The number of patients detained in this way has been steadily rising for several years, with particular ethnic groups and those with learning disabilities being particularly impacted in this process.

“One of the main issues is that all too often, the patient’s voice is lost within the process of trying to help them,” says Dr Clara Humpston, one of the senior authors on the paper. “Carers, clinicians and family members all have a challenging task in learning how to listen. That means accepting that there may not be a shared view of reality, but the patient’s experience is still true and valid, and ought not to be silenced.”

 

 

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JOURNAL

The Lancet Psychiatry

DOI

10.1016/S2215-0366(22)00104-3 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Data/statistical analysis

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

People

ARTICLE TITLE

Subjective experience and meaning of delusions in psychosis: a systematic review and qualitative evidence synthesis

ARTICLE PUBLICATION DATE

3-May-2022

Prison must not be ‘default option’ to cover up lack of support in care system and community

Girls and women who have been through the care system should be diverted away from custodial sentences into community alternatives wherever possible, says a new report published today.

Reports and Proceedings

LANCASTER UNIVERSITY

Girls and women who have been through the care system should be diverted away from custodial sentences into community alternatives wherever possible, says a new report published today.

And, adds the study, moves to prevent the criminalisation of girls in care need to be high on the agenda for change.

‘Disrupting the Routes between Care and Custody for Girls and Women’ is a hard-hitting report by Dr Claire Fitzpatrick and Dr Katie Hunter, from the Centre for Child and Family Justice Research at Lancaster University, Dr Julie Shaw, of Liverpool John Moores University, and Dr Jo Staines, of the University of Bristol.

Funded by the Nuffield Foundation, and launched at an online event today, the research explores the neglected experiences of imprisoned women from care, as well as those of care-experienced girls and young women in the community with youth justice system contact. As a minority within the justice system, girls and women are particularly likely to have their needs overlooked.

This study reveals how girls in care may experience ‘over-scrutiny’ in some care settings, leading to their unnecessary criminalisation, which contrasts directly to the lack of support they may face in relation to experiences of victimisation, leaving care support and imprisonment.

Highlighting evidence of the ‘immense harm’ that can come from imprisonment, the report states: “Prison must cease to be a default option when the lack of support in care and the community essentially helps to reproduce the well-trodden routes between care and custody”.

It also urges ‘far greater recognition’ of the profound impact of imprisonment across the generations, particularly on care-experienced mothers.

The research team call on local authorities, including Directors of Children’s Services, as well as Chief Constables, to renew their commitment to procedures aimed at preventing unnecessary criminalisation of children in care.

Despite increased recognition of this problem, and ongoing efforts to prevent it, police call-outs for minor incidents in some care homes remains a risk for some children.

As 18-year old study interviewee ‘Ellie’ said: “There’s still this stigma within the care system of you are in care, therefore every minor accident you have…is clearly intentional… let’s get you arrested.”  

The study found that girls in care who are in conflict with the law may be stigmatised not just because of their care status but also because of negative judgements relating to their gender or ethnicity.

There is also a serious need to recognise the limits of official files which could lead to negative perceptions of individuals. Girls and women felt strongly that they wanted workers to look beyond their official histories, avoid over-reliance on their files, and take time to get to know them and the context of their lives. 

Interviews were undertaken with 37 care-experienced women from across three prisons in England and 17 care-experienced girls and young women in the community across England who had also had youth justice involvement.

Many participants described backgrounds of abuse, serious violence and trauma, and had multiple experiences of victimisation throughout their lives. Violence and abuse at home was the most common reason reported for entering the care system. 

Over a third of care-experienced participants reported their first justice system contact occurred whilst in care. Of these, 11 were in children’s homes at the time of this contact, and over-criminalisation for minor offences in children’s homes was a common theme.

An escalation in offence seriousness was a feature of many women’s lives. For some, offending behaviour worsened after the ‘cliff edge’ of support after leaving care.

The research also includes interviews with 40 professionals who work with care-experienced women and girls, with expertise stemming from across a range of professional spheres.

 These interviews highlighted a commitment to diverting children from the youth justice system, and a recognition that this needed to involve far more than just avoiding prosecution.

Meanwhile, care-experienced girls and women reported that trusted relationships were key for providing and receiving support. Promoting such relationships requires going beyond the basics of providing accommodation, to being trauma responsive, supporting staff and raising aspirations.

Lead author Dr Fitzpatrick says: “Too many women in prison today were the girls in care of yesterday, and systemic failings in the wider society perpetuate this problem. We must do more to prevent this, and listening to, and learning from, the stories of criminalised girls and women is a vital starting point.”

The Director of Justice at the Nuffield Foundation, Rob Street, says: "There is a persistent over-representation of care-experienced girls and women in the youth and criminal justice systems. Encouragingly, this study presents clear recommendations which could improve the lives of these girls and women by breaking the link between care and custody which can impact care leavers throughout their lives.”

Report recommendations include:

• Placing a statutory duty on local authorities to prevent unnecessary criminalisation of children in care
• Recognising the limits of official care files and moving beyond them
• Promoting trusted and consistent relationships and challenging stigma
• Diverting girls and women from custody wherever possible
• Confronting the intergenerational harms that imprisonment creates

The study is officially launched on May 4 at an online end of project event called 'Disrupting the Routes between Care and Custody for Girls and Women'.

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METHOD OF RESEARCH

Observational study

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

People

ARTICLE TITLE

'Disrupting the Routes between Care and Custody for Girls and Women

ARTICLE PUBLICATION DATE

4-May-2022

How common are medication-related errors in home care?

Peer-Reviewed Publication

WILEY

In a questionnaire-based study published in Pharmacology Research & Perspectives that included 485 fully trained nurses of 107 home care services, nearly half of all nursing staff made at least one error within the last year when administering medications.  

In the study, 41.6% of nurses reported medication errors within a 12-month period, and 14.8% did not provide an answer. Medication errors experienced by patients include taking the wrong dose or quantity of a particular drug, as well as omission of a drug or taking unlicensed drugs. 

Nurses who had attended medication training within the last 2 years were less likely to make errors. 

“The study results underline the need for regularly recurring medication training for nurses to ensure a high level of patient safety—especially in the home care sector, as nurses are the only professional group on site,” said lead author Sandra Strube-Lahmann, RN, MSc, PhD, of Charité - Universitätsmedizin Berlin, in Germany.

URL Upon Publication: https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/prp2.953

About the Journal

Pharmacology Research & Perspectives is the outlet for fundamental and applied pharmacology. An official journal of the American Society for Pharmacology and Experimental Therapeutics and the British Pharmacological Society this gold open access journal publishes original research, reviews and perspectives in all areas of preclinical and clinical pharmacology, education and related research areas including articles that disprove a hypothesis.

About Wiley

Wiley is a global leader in research and education, unlocking human potential by enabling discovery, powering education, and shaping workforces. For over 200 years, Wiley has fueled the world’s knowledge ecosystem. Today, our high-impact content, platforms, and services help researchers, learners, institutions, and corporations achieve their goals in an ever-changing world. Visit us at  Wiley.com, like us on Facebook and follow us on Twitter and LinkedIn.

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JOURNAL

Pharmacology Research & Perspectives

DOI

10.1002/prp2.953 

ARTICLE TITLE

Patient Safety in Homecare: A Multicenter Cross-sectional Study about Medication Errors and Medication Management of Nurses

ARTICLE PUBLICATION DATE

4-May-2022

Dog coronavirus jumps to humans, with a protein shift

Peer-Reviewed Publication

CORNELL UNIVERSITY

ITHACA, N.Y. – Cornell University researchers have identified a shift that occurs in canine coronavirus that may provide clues as to how it transmits from animals to humans.

A new canine coronavirus was first identified in two Malaysian human patients who developed pneumonia in 2017-18. A group of other scientists isolated the canine coronavirus, sequenced it, and published their findings in 2021.

Now, a team led by researchers from Cornell and Temple University has identified a pattern that occurs in a terminus of the canine coronavirus spike protein – the area of the virus that facilitates entry into a host cell. This pattern shows the virus shifts from infecting both the intestines and respiratory system of the animal host to infecting only the respiratory system in a human host.

The researchers identified a change in the terminus – known as the N terminus – a region of the molecule with alterations also detected in another coronavirus, which jumped from bats to humans, where it causes a common cold.

“This study identifies some of the molecular mechanisms underlying a host shift from dog coronavirus to a new human host, that may also be important in the circulation of a new human coronavirus that we previously didn’t know about,” said Michael Stanhope, professor of public and ecosystem health at Cornell. First author, Jordan Zehr, is a doctoral student at Temple University. The paper was published in the journal Viruses.

In the study, the researchers used state-of-the-art molecular evolution tools to assess how pressures from natural selection may have influenced the canine coronavirus’ evolution.

The same variant of canine coronavirus found in Malaysia was also reported in 2021 in a few people in Haiti, who also had respiratory illness.

Stanhope believes more study is needed to understand if the viral shifts and jumps to humans occurred spontaneously in different parts of the world or if this coronavirus has been circulating for perhaps many decades in the human population without detection.

For additional information, see this Cornell Chronicle story.

-30-

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JOURNAL

Viruses

DOI

10.3390/v14050853 

Dog owners’ concerns and experience accessing veterinary care during the COVID-19 pandemic

Peer-Reviewed Publication

WILEY

New research indicates that the veterinary profession responded well during the COVID-19 pandemic despite many dog owners feeling concerned about the availability of veterinary care during this time due to service restrictions.  

In the study published in Vet Record, investigators at Dogs Trust, a British animal welfare charity and humane society, analyzed surveys completed by dog owners in the UK in May (during the first nationwide lockdown) and October 2020. The team also examined diaries completed by dog owners in the UK or the Republic of Ireland in April–November 2020.  

During the first stage of the nationwide lockdown, UK government advice about limiting service provision resulted in the Royal College of Veterinary Surgeons and British Veterinary Association jointly issuing guidance to the profession regarding restricting non-emergency veterinary healthcare. Alongside this, in the initial months of the pandemic, veterinary healthcare availability worried 32.4% (1431/4922) of respondents. However, between late March and November, 99.5% (1,794/1,843) of those needing to contact a veterinarian managed to do so. 

Over one-fifth of respondents (22.2%) experienced remote consultations during the early stages of the pandemic. 

Delays and cancellations of procedures affected 28.0% (82/293) of dogs that owners planned to neuter and 34.2% (460/1346) of dogs that owners intended to vaccinate.   

“The majority of the respondents thought that remote consultations were convenient. This method also enabled those who were shielding or unable to travel to the practice to access veterinary care,” said co–first author Sara C. Owczarczak-Garstecka, PhD. “It’s reassuring that despite owners’ fears about service restrictions, veterinary practices appear to have adapted well to unprecedented circumstances and responded to owners’ urgent care needs,” added co–first author Katrina E. Holland, PhD.     

URL Upon Publication: https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/vetr.1681 

Additional Information 

About the Journal

Veterinary Record (branded as Vet Record) is the official journal of the British Veterinary Association (BVA) and has been published since 1888. It contains news, opinion, letters, scientific reviews and original research papers and communications on a wide range of veterinary topics, along with disease surveillance reports, obituaries, careers information, business and innovation news and summaries of research papers in other journals. It is published on behalf of the BVA by Wiley.

About Wiley

Wiley is a global leader in research and education, unlocking human potential by enabling discovery, powering education, and shaping workforces. For over 200 years, Wiley has fueled the world’s knowledge ecosystem. Today, our high-impact content, platforms, and services help researchers, learners, institutions, and corporations achieve their goals in an ever-changing world. Visit us at  Wiley.com, like us on Facebook and follow us on Twitter and LinkedIn.

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JOURNAL

Veterinary Record

DOI

10.1002/vetr.1681 

ARTICLE TITLE

Accessing veterinary healthcare during the Covid-19 pandemic: a mixed-methods analysis of UK and Republic of Ireland dog owners’ concerns and experiences

ARTICLE PUBLICATION DATE

4-May-2022

Do adult-to-child ratios and group sizes matter in early childhood education?

Peer-Reviewed Publication

WILEY

An article in Campbell Systematic Reviews reveals that there are surprisingly few high-quality studies that have examined the effects of reducing adult/child ratios and group sizes on factors such as young children’s psychosocial adjustment, development, and well-being in early childhood education and care.

The review analyzed evidence from 12 studies, two of which were randomized control trials, representing eight different populations.

Although investigators noted that it’s not possible to draw any definitive conclusions, results tentatively suggest that fewer children per adult and smaller group sizes may increase process quality—defined as more positive adult/child and child/child interactions, less coercive and controlling adult interference, and less aggressive and more prosocial child behavior.

“Findings from the present review may be seen as a testimony to the urgent need for more contemporary high quality research exploring the effects of changes in adult/child ratio and group size in ECEC on measures of process quality and child outcomes,” said corresponding author Nina Thorup Dalgaard, PhD, of Vive, the Danish Center for Social Science Research. 

“Despite the fact that most stakeholders agree that adult/child ratio and group size are important parameters, it is surprising that studies of the effects of changing these are on average 30 years old.”

URL Upon Publication: https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/cl2.1239

Additional Information

About the Journal

Campbell Systematic Reviews is an open access journal prepared under the editorial control of the Campbell Collaboration. The journal publishes systematic reviews, evidence and gap maps, and methods research papers.  

About Wiley

Wiley is a global leader in research and education, unlocking human potential by enabling discovery, powering education, and shaping workforces. For over 200 years, Wiley has fueled the world’s knowledge ecosystem. Today, our high-impact content, platforms, and services help researchers, learners, institutions, and corporations achieve their goals in an ever-changing world. Visit us at  Wiley.com, like us on Facebook and follow us on Twitter and LinkedIn.

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JOURNAL

Campbell Systematic Reviews

DOI

10.1002/cl2.1239 

ARTICLE TITLE

Adult-to-child ratios and group sizes in early childhood education and care need more high-quality research

ARTICLE PUBLICATION DATE

4-May-2022

New map may help conservation efforts for an endangered songbird

Peer-Reviewed Publication

WILEY

Researchers have developed and used a model to estimate the density of the golden-cheeked warbler, an endangered songbird that breeds in Ashe juniper and oak woodlands in central Texas. In a study published in the Journal of Wildlife Management, the team created a warbler distribution map that identifies areas important for conservation of the species, indicating places where improvement and restoration of habitat may have the greatest benefit. 

The model results indicated that management activities to increase warbler density should promote woodlands with high tree canopy cover, approximately 60–80% Ashe juniper composition, and tree heights higher than 3 meters. 

“We conducted more than 1,800 point count surveys to determine the distribution of this iconic Texas species that breeds nowhere else in the world,” said lead author James M. Mueller, PhD, of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. “The species is most abundant in areas with mature juniper-oak woodlands, but our model provides an important new understanding of the conditions where the species occurs in lower densities in associated shrublands such as in the more arid southwestern portion of its range." 

URL Upon Publication: https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/jwmg.22236 

Additional Information 

NOTE: The information contained in this release is protected by copyright. Please include journal attribution in all coverage. For more information or to obtain a PDF of any study, please contact:

About the Journal

The Journal of Wildlife Management publishes manuscripts containing information from original research that contributes to basic wildlife science. Suitable topics include investigations into the biology and ecology of wildlife and their habitats that has direct or indirect implications for wildlife management and conservation.

About Wiley

Wiley is a global leader in research and education, unlocking human potential by enabling discovery, powering education, and shaping workforces. For over 200 years, Wiley has fueled the world’s knowledge ecosystem. Today, our high-impact content, platforms, and services help researchers, learners, institutions, and corporations achieve their goals in an ever-changing world. Visit us at  Wiley.com, like us on Facebook and follow us on Twitter and LinkedIn.

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JOURNAL

Journal of Wildlife Management

DOI

10.1002/jwmg.22236 

ARTICLE TITLE

Multi-scale species density model for conserving an endangered songbird

ARTICLE PUBLICATION DATE

4-May-2022

Advertising source may drive experience for some Siri users

Reports and Proceedings

PENN STATE

May 2, 2022, NEW ORLEANS — Advertisements on a voice assistant like Alexa or Siri may be more effective if the assistant is viewed as the medium for the ad, not the source. However, user motives play a role in how these persuasive messages are received, according to a new study in the proceedings of the premier ACM Conference on Human-Computer Interaction (CHI 2022).

In 2017, Google faced backlash from Google Home users who felt that ad messages from the voice assistant (VA) were inappropriate. It seemed generating ad revenue on VAs — like that on search engines — was not feasible­.

The study presented today says there still may be an opportunity to run effective ads on VAs. It found that ads are better received if the VA is a medium — like radio— and not the source of the ads.

Reactions to ads depended on whether the user was informationally motivated (one who asks about the weather or news) or socially motivated (one who uses VAs to cope with loneliness or just to chat).

Socially motivated users see VAs as “companions in their midst,” according to S. Shyam Sundar, James P. Jimirro Professor of Media Effects in the Donald P. Bellisario College of Communications at Penn State and co-director of the Media Effects Research Laboratory.

“There are many skills that have been added to VAs that are very social in nature,” Sundar said. “You can have a casual chat, ask them to tell a joke, thank them when they wish you ‘Good Morning,’ and so on.”

If the VA promotes a brand in the middle of such social exchanges, it is not so off-putting, according to Eugene Cho, assistant professor at the College of New Jersey, and lead author of the study, who worked with Sundar.

The researchers recruited 264 participants who were familiar with VAs for their experiment. They were provided two different scenarios in which a specific question was posed to Siri. They listened to Siri’s response to the question, which was followed by an ad related to the query.

Example: When a participant asked, “Siri, how do I make pumpkin spiced latte?” Siri responded with the recipe, followed by an advertisement for Starbucks and how to get a pumpkin spiced latte using the company’s app. Chosen randomly, some users heard the ad as a human spokesperson and others heard the voice of Siri directly relaying the ad.   

Those with high informational motives responded negatively to ads when Siri was the source — versus the human spokesperson. On the other hand, social motives led to “higher social presence” when Siri delivered the ads.

“Motivations are linked to usage,” Cho said. “[For Google Home], maybe it wasn't the ad that was so bad. Maybe it was the content and the context that was the problem.”

These findings are particularly relevant to companies like Google whose main source of revenue comes from advertising.

“We understand that ads are inevitable to their business model,” Sundar said. “We want the way ads are delivered to be more human-centered and contextually relevant. Convert ads into a service. That’s how you can be both commercially viable and socially responsible.”

Sundar said advertising shouldn’t be a “sneak attack.” Through their research, the researchers are advocating a user-responsive approach that is more helpful and less deceiving.

According to Cho, companies that make VAs have the capability to learn about their users and provide an experience suitable to them. “Instead of running ads indiscriminately, they can personalize ad delivery based on user motivations,” she added.

 Ancient roots of tungsten in western North America

V. Elongo; H. Falck; K.L. Rasmussen; L.J. Robbins; R.A. Creaser ...
Abstract: The highly irregular and localized distribution of tungsten deposits worldwide constitutes a supply challenge for basic industries such as steel and carbides. Over Earth’s history, tungsten has preferentially accumulated at paleocontinental margins formed during the breakup of supercontinents. Later crustal thickening of these paleogeographic regions and the magmas they produce are associated with large tungsten districts. However, all of the largest tungsten deposits in the modern North American Cordillera, which preserves over 3 b.y. of geologic record in a paleocontinental margin with abundant crustal magmatism, are limited to the narrow Canadian Tungsten Belt in northwestern Canada. We use neodymium isotopic compositions of scheelite (CaWO4) from the Canadian Tungsten Belt and the paleogeographic distribution of tungsten deposits in the North American Cordillera to constrain the factors that control tungsten distribution. We document that tungsten is specifically associated with materials that, on average, were derived from the mantle during the Mesoarchean to Paleoproterozoic. Weathering and erosion of the supercontinents Columbia and Rodinia favored pre-enrichment of tungsten in sediments. The orogenic heating of pre-enriched sediments produced reduced melts that were capable of efficiently scavenging tungsten and formed the largest deposits in North America.
View article: https://pubs.geoscienceworld.org/gsa/geology/article-abstract/doi/10.1130/G49801.1/612990/Ancient-roots-of-tungsten-in-western-North-America

Pothole-like depressions in the chamber floor of the Sudbury Igneous Complex, Canada
S.Yu. Chistyakova; R.M. Latypov
Abstract: The magmatic stratigraphy of the Sudbury Igneous Complex (Canada) is thought to have resulted from closed-system differentiation of an initially homogeneous impact melt sheet. The topography of its upward-growing chamber floor is therefore thought to have been planar and subhorizontal. However, we report on the discovery of a large pothole-like depression (~300 m in depth and ~550 m in width) in the chamber floor of this complex. The depression has been revealed through two-dimensional mapping of igneous layering that is defined by systematic vertical changes in cumulus assemblages and bulk rock chemistry. Although the formation of the depression by syn- to post-magmatic folding and/or slumping of chamber floor cumulates cannot be completely excluded, we favor an alternative explanation that follows from the recent recognition that the Sudbury Igneous Complex melt sheet crystallized concurrently from the floor and roof inward. The roof sequence was subsequently disrupted and collapsed as large discrete blocks onto the floor sequence. This may have resulted in local irregularities in topography of the upward-growing chamber floor so that crystal deposition onto and between the neighboring blocks produced pothole-like depressions. The phenomenon of physical disruption of roof sequences appears to provide a reasonable explanation for the common lack of the rocks that grew from the roof downward in layered intrusions.
View article: https://pubs.geoscienceworld.org/gsa/geology/article-abstract/doi/10.1130/G49928.1/613388/Pothole-like-depressions-in-the-chamber-floor-of

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