Without proper management, Cerrado becomes disfigured and less resilient to climate change

A study conducted over a period of 14 years in the Brazilian savanna-like biome shows its typical vegetation rapidly becoming ‘cerradão’ – a biodiversity-poor forest formation – while resistance to drought and wildfires weakens

FUNDAÇÃO DE AMPARO À PESQUISA DO ESTADO DE SÃO PAULO

 

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A TYPICAL CERRADO TREE WILTING IN THE SHADOW OF THE CERRADÃO’S CANOPY

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CREDIT: GISELDA DURIGAN

The Cerrado, Brazil’s savanna biome, is being destroyed at a fast pace, and inadequate management of remnants is transforming large areas of the biome into cerradão, a biodiversity-poor forest formation in which species typical of the Cerrado mingle with generalist species occupying gallery forest and other structures.

Scientists wonder whether areas of cerradão can conserve the biodiversity of the Cerrado. If not, they may evolve into a type of biodiverse forest similar to the Atlantic Rainforest biome, or they may become neither one nor the other.

A long-term study set out to find answers to these questions by investigating changes occurring over a 14-year period in a sample area of cerradão containing 256 plots in Assis Ecological Station, a conservation unit in São Paulo state. 

An article on the study is published in the journal Forest Ecology and Management.

Designed and supervised by Giselda Durigan, a professor at the State University of Campinas’s Institute of Biology (IB-UNICAMP), the study was part of the PhD research of Francisco Ferreira de Miranda Santos, first author of the article. 

The last author is Ricardo Ribeiro Rodrigues, a professor at the University of São Paulo’s Luiz de Queiroz College of Agriculture (ESALQ-USP) and Santos’s thesis advisor.

The study site has been protected from fire for at least 60 years and therefore has not benefited from carefully managed regular burnings with zoning and a rotating fire schedule, now recognized as the best conservation method for the Cerrado (read more at: agencia.fapesp.br/26064). 

Despite the long period without disturbance, tree basal area increased and the largest trees continued to grow, but tree density decreased over time. Community diversity increased slightly, owing to a small gain in species richness.

Durigan stressed the hard work done by the researchers. “Studies of forest dynamics take a long time as a matter of course. Changes happen slowly, and it’s necessary to wait patiently for the forest to tell its own story. The challenge is understanding how change is influenced over time by extreme heat and cold, excessive or insufficient rain, high winds, or simple competition among trees for light, water and nutrients. Besides patience, these studies also require discipline and hard work to collect data on different occasions, as well as inspiration and a sound theoretical foundation to formulate hypotheses and interpret the data,” she said.

The size of the study site (over 10 hectares) and the number of trees identified and measured (over 20,000) made the project extremely challenging. “Each measurement activity involved a team of four working for about a year to measure all the trees all over again, to replace lost numbering, and to identify and mark new individuals, despite rain, thorns, ticks, gadflies, armadillo burrows, etc.,” she said. “Santos then spent months in front of a computer to put all this into his PhD in ecology at UNICAMP, organizing a giant database, detecting inconsistencies, updating species nomenclature, and comparing measurements made at different times to track the history of each tree.”

This account is interesting because it helps dispel the false idea that scientific progress is rectilinear. When studies are described in journal articles, they seem straightforward, apart from the difficulties inherent in the technical language used, but a great deal of effort is needed to reach such simplicity. Durigan told how she and Santos together faced the challenge of having to correct errors in the coordinates of the 256 plots that made the research even harder. “There was only one solution. We had to go back to the site, find certain numbered trees in the dense undergrowth, plot their positions correctly, and compare them with the positions on the map. Eventually, we discovered the errors could be corrected simply by turning the network of coordinates 90 degrees anticlockwise. Everything then fell into place,” she said.

As a result of the study, the researchers discovered that 54% of the trees identified in the initial survey had died 14 years later and that some 10,000 new trees had grown to 5 cm in diameter. While 14 years may seem a long time to humans, it is a short period for such a large-scale change in vegetation. In other words, the Cerrado can degenerate rapidly into cerradão once the process has begun.

“The total number of trees decreased in the period. The competition imposed by large trees caused the death of small ones. The outcome of this ‘war’ was the victory of the largest, which continued to grow, accumulating biomass and carbon. The number practically tripled in the 14-year period. However, the largest trees in areas of cerradão aren’t as large as the trees in tropical forest, rarely exceeding 30 cm in diameter,” Durigan said.

The study revealed changes not only in the structure of the site but also in its species composition, she added. Forest species and generalists that tolerate shade continued to flourish, while species typical of the Cerrado were unable to get enough sunlight and disappeared. “The few Cerrado-type trees still alive have no descendants because they don’t germinate or even survive in the shade. Many iconic species are vanishing, from the Souari nut [Caryocar brasiliense] and Pequi to the Mangaba [Hancornia speciosa], Curriola [Pouteria ramiflora], Barbatimão [Stryphnodendron adstringens] and Paineirinha [Eriotheca gracilipes],” she said. 

What is the significance of these changes from the standpoint of conservation? “First, we can’t expect this area to contribute to conservation of the flora in the Cerrado. Cerradão is closed-canopy woodland, and all that shade is a hostile environment for the biome’s typical species. Although species richness increased by 10%, Cerrado-type tree losses were dramatic and irreversible. Second, the continuous accumulation of biomass in a region of deep sandy soil that can’t retain moisture is alarming,” she said.

Areas of cerradão are therefore more likely to collapse during long droughts than open areas of the Cerrado. In a time of global climate crisis, extreme events are increasingly frequent. The greater the arboreal biomass, the more rain is intercepted by the forest canopy and the more water is consumed by the trees. If less water is captured and more is consumed, the stored water will run out sooner. While a five-month drought does not affect trees in open areas, it can lead to many tree deaths in areas of cerradão.

“If climate change in the region led to an increase in and better distribution of rainfall, this new forest would be compatible with local environmental conditions, but the record temperatures recorded there are forcing the trees to consume more and more water as the rainfall decreases, so collapse is increasingly likely. If many trees die, the carbon stored in them returns to the atmosphere, and large amounts of dead timber increase the probability of catastrophic fires. Unlike typical Cerrado vegetation, cerradão isn’t adapted to fire. If it burns in extreme conditions, it starts functioning as degraded forest,” Durigan said.

Rodrigues added other details. “The article reflects the strenuous personal efforts of PhD candidate Santos, whose career as a scientist it solidifies, and is the first to describe the dynamics of a permanent area of more than 10 hectares of continuous cerradão in São Paulo state, with surprising data relating to the speed, intensity and direction of changes in the composition of tree species over a fairly long period,” he said. “It’s a major contribution that supports good public policy for conservation and restoration of biodiversity in the challenging context of climate change.”

The study confirmed a hypothesis raised some time ago by the researchers but not yet totally tested on this scale. They surmised that the simplistic attitude of merely protecting biodiversity and isolating natural or restored fragments from anthropic disturbance while ignoring the historical and cultural context for sustainable management of natural ecosystems might not be the best solution, and in fact was probably incompatible even with biodiversity conservation.

The study was supported by FAPESP via the Thematic Project “Diversity, dynamics and conservation in São Paulo state forests: 40 ha of permanent parcels”, for which Rodrigues is principal investigator.

About São Paulo Research Foundation (FAPESP)

The São Paulo Research Foundation (FAPESP) is a public institution with the mission of supporting scientific research in all fields of knowledge by awarding scholarships, fellowships and grants to investigators linked with higher education and research institutions in the State of São Paulo, Brazil. FAPESP is aware that the very best research can only be done by working with the best researchers internationally. Therefore, it has established partnerships with funding agencies, higher education, private companies, and research organizations in other countries known for the quality of their research and has been encouraging scientists funded by its grants to further develop their international collaboration. You can learn more about FAPESP at www.fapesp.br/en and visit FAPESP news agency at www.agencia.fapesp.br/en to keep updated with the latest scientific breakthroughs FAPESP helps achieve through its many programs, awards and research centers. You may also subscribe to FAPESP news agency at http://agencia.fapesp.br/subscribe.

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JOURNAL

Forest Ecology and Management

DOI

10.1016/j.foreco.2024.121698 

ARTICLE TITLE

Tree community dynamics in the cerradão (2002-2016): A case of biome shift

 

Developmental milestone attainment in children before and during the pandemic

JAMA Pediatrics

About The Study: Modest decreases in developmental screening scores suggest reason for cautious optimism about the development of a generation of U.S. children exposed to the COVID-19 pandemic in this study including 50,000 children. Continued attention to developmental surveillance is critical since the long-term population- and individual-level implications of these changes are unclear. 

Authors: Sara B. Johnson, Ph.D., M.P.H., of the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine in Baltimore, is the corresponding author.

To access the embargoed study: Visit our For The Media website at this link https://media.jamanetwork.com/

(doi:10.1001/jamapediatrics.2024.0683)

Editor’s Note: Please see the article for additional information, including other authors, author contributions and affiliations, conflict of interest and financial disclosures, and funding and support.

#  #  #

Embed this link to provide your readers free access to the full-text article This link will be live at the embargo time https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamapediatrics/fullarticle/10.1001/jamapediatrics.2024.0683?guestAccessKey=6a03f5b4-4727-4397-b8a4-cc2fcd7629ea&utm_source=For_The_Media&utm_medium=referral&utm_campaign=ftm_links&utm_content=tfl&utm_term=042224

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JOURNAL

JAMA Pediatrics

Study finds COVID-19 pandemic led to some, but not many, developmental milestone delays in infants and young children

Johns Hopkins Children’s Center investigators say the study findings are reassuring and provide “cautious optimism” about the development of young children exposed to pandemic-related restrictions

JOHNS HOPKINS MEDICINE

Infants and children 5 years old and younger experienced only “modest” delays in developmental milestones due to the COVID-19 pandemic disruptions and restrictions, a study led by Johns Hopkins Children’s Center finds.

In a report on the study that will be published April 22 in JAMA Pediatrics, investigators evaluated possible links between pandemic-related disruptions to everyday life and changes in developmental milestone screening scores. The data were from the Comprehensive Health and Decision Information System (CHADIS), a web-based screening platform caregivers use to complete surveys about their children’s development. It is used by more than 5,000 pediatric practices in 48 U.S. states.

Using the Ages and Stages Questionnaire-3 (ASQ-3), a caregiver-completed measure of child development routinely collected as part of pediatric care, researchers say they found only small decreases in communication, problem-solving, and personal-social skills, and no changes in fine or gross motor skills among children in the study.

“We found, overall, that while there are some changes, the sky is not falling, and that is a really important and reassuring finding,” says Sara Johnson, Ph.D., M.P.H., corresponding author of the study, director of the Rales Center for the Integration of Health and Education at Johns Hopkins Children’s Center, and Blanket Fort Foundation professor of pediatrics at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine.

Numerous studies, the researchers say, found the COVID-19 pandemic and related lockdown restrictions disrupted the lives of many people, including families with young children. Everyday life and daily routines were upended, as schools and child care centers closed, many people began working from home and social contacts diminished. Many experienced increased stress, anxiety and social isolation due to these changes and activity cancellations.

Research has also shown the pandemic is linked to lower child health-related quality of life, increased mental health concerns, decreased sleep and increased risk of obesity. However, the impact of the pandemic on developmental milestones among young children in the U.S. remained unclear, in part because studies designed to address them were done outside the United States, or in small samples. In the new study, Children’s Center researchers looked at the developmental milestone status of 50,205 children, ages 0 to 5 years, drawn from a sample of more than half a million children whose parents or caregivers completed the ASQ-3. The ASQ-3 assesses children’s developmental milestones in five skill domains: communication, gross motor, fine motor, problem-solving and personal-social.

Researchers compared the children before and during the pandemic from 2018 to 2022 and found ASQ-3 score decreases in the communication (about 3%), problem-solving (about 2%) and personal-social (about 2%) skill domains. They found no changes in fine or gross motor skill domains. When looking specifically at infants 0–12 months old, similarly modest effects were observed, and there were only decreases in the communication domain (about 3%) and problem-solving domain (about 2%).

“We thought it was possible infants might experience less impact than the older kids, given that many caregivers may have spent more time at home with their very young children,” says Johnson. “But we saw generally the same things in infants as we did for older kids.”

Also, given an increase in parent and caregiver worry and stress, researchers investigated whether parents and caregivers reported more worries about their child during the pandemic, regardless of milestone achievement, and found worries about their child only increased slightly during the pandemic, compared to before the pandemic.

While the researchers say the findings are reassuring, they add that the implications for children’s long-term development remain unclear.

“It is important for us to continue to keep an eye on kids of all ages in terms of development, so we can understand whether these changes have longer-term implications for children or if new challenges emerge as children age,” says Johnson.

Johnson and her team of investigators believe their study findings will aid in planning for future public health crises, and also demonstrate the importance of shoring up the clinical infrastructure of overburdened health systems in the U.S., particularly developmental behavioral pediatricians, who are specially trained to evaluate and treat developmental concerns. These resources will be essential to respond to the developmental needs of children now and in the future.

The investigators cautioned that the study did not factor in some variables that might have changed the findings, such as prenatal substance abuse and other health conditions. In addition, infants born preterm were excluded from the study, which may underestimate developmental impacts for this subgroup. Researchers also cannot rule out “selection bias” among health care providers participating in CHADIS, and there was no comparison group of children who weren’t exposed to COVID-19 pandemic restrictions.

Along with Johnson, the study authors from Johns Hopkins include Molly Kuehn, Jennifer Lambert, Lauren Klein, Barbara Howard (also with CHADIS Inc.), Raymond Sturner (also with the Center for Promotion of Child Development through Primary Care) and Eliana Perrin. J. Paul Spin from EVERSANA was also an author.

The study was funded by the Johns Hopkins Population Center and its infrastructure grant (P2CHD042854) from the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD).

Howard and Sturner are members of the board of directors of the Center for Promotion of Child Development through Primary Care, and are paid employees or consultants at both the center and CHADIS, Inc. The authors affiliated with The Johns Hopkins University did not declare any conflicts of interest under Johns Hopkins University policies.

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JOURNAL

PEDIATRICS

 

When thoughts flow in one direction

Charité study in Science decodes wiring of the human neocortex

CHARITÉ - UNIVERSITÄTSMEDIZIN BERLIN

 

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EXPERIMENTAL SETUP FOR MULTI-PATCH EXPERIMENTS THAT RECORD THE ACTIVITY OF UP TO TEN NEURONS © CHARITÉ | YANGFAN PENG

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CREDIT: © CHARITÉ | YANGFAN PENG

Contrary to previous assumptions, nerve cells in the human neocortex are wired differently than in mice. Those are the findings of a new study conducted by Charité – Universitätsmedizin Berlin and published in the journal Science.* The study found that human neurons communicate in one direction, while in mice, signals tend to flow in loops. This increases the efficiency and capacity of the human brain to process information. These discoveries could further the development of artificial neural networks.

The neocortex, a critical structure for human intelligence, is less than five millimeters thick. There, in the outermost layer of the brain, 20 billion neurons process countless sensory perceptions, plan actions, and form the basis of our consciousness. How do these neurons process all this complex information? That largely depends on how they are “wired” to each other.

More complex neocortex – different information processing

“Our previous understanding of neural architecture in the neocortex is based primarily on findings from animal models such as mice,” explains Prof. Jörg Geiger, Director of the Institute for Neurophysiology at Charité. In those models, the neighboring neurons frequently communicate with each other as if they are in dialogue. One neuron signals another, and then that one sends a signal back. That means the information often flows in recurrent loops.”

The human neocortex is much thicker and more complex than that of a mouse. Nonetheless, researchers had previously assumed – in part due to lack of data – that it follows the same basic principles of connectivity. A team of Charité researchers led by Geiger has now used exceptionally rare tissue samples and state-of-the-art technology to demonstrate that this is not the case.

A clever method of listening in on neuronal communication

For the study, the researchers examined brain tissue from 23 people who had undergone neurosurgery at Charité to treat drug-resistant epilepsy. During surgery, it was medically necessary to remove brain tissue in order to gain access to the diseased structures beneath it. The patients had consented to the use of this access tissue for research purposes.

To be able to observe the flows of signals between neighboring neurons in the outermost layer of the human neocortex, the team developed an improved version of what is known as the “multipatch” technique. This allowed the researchers to listen in on the communications taking place between as many as ten neurons at once (for details, see “About the method”). As a result, they were able to take the necessary number of measurements to map the network in the short time before the cells ceased their activity outside the body. In all, they analyzed the communication channels among nearly 1,170 neurons with about 7,200 possible connections.

Feed-forward instead of in cycles

They found that only a small fraction of the neurons engaged in reciprocal dialogue with each other. “In humans, the information tends to flow in one direction instead. It seldom returns to the starting point either directly or via cycles,” explains Dr. Yangfan Peng, first author of the publication. He worked on the study at the Institute for Neurophysiology and is now based at the Department of Neurology and the Neuroscience Research Center at Charité. The team used a computer simulation that they devised according to the same principles underlying the human network architecture to demonstrate that this forward-directed signal flow has benefits in terms of processing data.

The researchers gave the artificial neural network a typical machine learning task: recognizing the correct numbers from audio recordings of spoken digits. The network model that mimicked the human structures achieved more correct responses to this speech recognition task than the one modeled on mice. It was also more efficient, with the same performance requiring the equivalent of 380 neurons in the mouse model, but only 150 in the human one.

An economic role model for AI?

“The directed network architecture we see in humans is more powerful and conserves resources because more independent neurons can handle different tasks simultaneously,” Peng explains. “This means that the local network can store more information. It isn’t clear yet whether our findings within the outermost layer of the temporal cortex extend to other cortical regions, or how well they might explain the unique cognitive abilities of humans.”

In the past, AI developers have looked to biological models for inspiration in designing artificial neural networks, but have also optimized their algorithms independently of the biological models. “Many artificial neural networks already use some form of this forward-directed connectivity because it delivers better results for some tasks,” Geiger says. “It’s fascinating to see that the human brain also shows similar network principles. These insights into cost-efficient information processing in the human neocortex could provide further inspiration for refining AI networks.”

*Peng Y. et al. Directed and acyclic synaptic connectivity in the human layer 2-3 cortical microcircuit. Science 2024 Apr 18. doi: 10.1126/science.adg8828

About the study

The work was done in close cooperation between the basic research and clinical departments of Charité. Under the leadership of the Institute of Neurophysiology, the following were involved: the Department of Neurosurgery, the Department of Neurology with Experimental Neurology, the Institute of Integrative Neuroanatomy, the Department of Neuropathology, the Neuroscience Research Center, and the NeuroCure Cluster of Excellence, with support from the University Clinic for Neurosurgery at Evangelisches Klinikum Bethel and the Institute of Neuroinformatics at ETH Zurich.

About the method

When surgery is performed to treat drug-resistant, or refractory, epilepsy, it is often medically necessary to remove brain tissue. The explicit consent of patients was required in order to examine this valuable tissue for the study that has just been published. The research group is profoundly grateful to the patients for their consent. The authors used what is known as the “patch-clamp” method to analyze synaptic communication between neurons. In this technique, an ultra-thin glass pipette is attached to a single neuron under a microscope to measure or stimulate the cell’s electrical activity. The study utilized an advanced form of this technique in which multiple of these micropipettes simultaneously record the activity and connectivity of up to ten neurons (the “multipatch” method). To be able to position the pipettes precisely, the device is equipped with robot arms that enable movements in the nanometer range. The measurement process is highly challenging and labor-intensive. Using two devices in parallel allowed the team to study several hundred connections between the nerve cells for each tissue sample. The brain tissue can be preserved for up to two days outside the body in an artificial nutrient solution before activity ceases.

Multi-patch device with robot [VIDEO] | 

Rotating reconstruction of neu [VIDEO] | 

A micropipette from the multip [VIDEO] |

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JOURNAL

Science

DOI

10.1126/science.adg8828 

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

Human tissue samples

ARTICLE TITLE

Directed and acyclic synaptic connectivity in the human layer 2-3 cortical microcircuit

ARTICLE PUBLICATION DATE

19-Apr-2024

 

Sleeter to receive funding for website project

GEORGE MASON UNIVERSITY

Nathan Sleeter, Research Assistant Professor, History and Art History, Roy Rosenzweig Center for History and New Media (RRCHNM), is set to receive funding for: “American Indian Science and Engineering Society (AISES) at 50 website.”

RRCHNM researchers will develop a website that will tell the story of AISES’s first 50 years, its founding mission, its growth, and the individuals who have been part of its work supporting American Indians in STEM. Sleeter will serve as project director.

The researchers will also conduct and record oral history interviews with four key AISES originators — Al Qöyawayma, Carol Gardipe, George Thomas, and Jerry Elliott, visionaries from the organization’s history.

They will also edit interviews into a series of 12-15-minute videos, each of which will tell the story of AISES’s 50-year history.

Additionally, the researchers will collect annotated photographs, documents, and objects that communicate AISES’s 50-year history.

Finally, they will design and develop a WordPress website that will feature these resources along with links to full interviews with sources. This website will be linked from the AISES main website.

Regarding the importance of the project, Sleeter said, "The AISES at 50 project represents an important resource for the public to learn more about the history of Indigenous Americans in higher education."

Sleeter will receive $92,461 from AISES for this project. Funding will begin in May 2024 and will end in late April 2025.

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ABOUT GEORGE MASON UNIVERSITY

George Mason University is Virginia’s largest public research university. Located near Washington, D.C., Mason enrolls more than 40,000 students from 130 countries and all 50 states. Mason has grown rapidly over the past half-century and is recognized for its innovation and entrepreneurship, remarkable diversity, and commitment to accessibility. In 2023, the university launched Mason Now: Power the Possible, a one-billion-dollar comprehensive campaign to support student success, research, innovation, community, and stewardship. Learn more at gmu.edu.

 

Life goals and their changes drive success

New study from University of Houston indicates if you can dream it, you can be it

UNIVERSITY OF HOUSTON

 

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RODICA DAMIAN, UNIVERSITY OF HOUSTON ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR OF PSYCHOLOGY, FOUND THAT PERSONAL CHANGES MAY PREDICT GOAL SUCCESS.

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CREDIT: UNIVERSITY OF HOUSTON

“Where is my life going?” “Who do I want to be?”  

As future-thinkers, adolescents spend significant time contemplating these types of questions about their life goals. A new study from the University of Houston shows that as people grow from teenagers to young adults, they tend to change the importance they place on certain life goals, but one thing is certain: The existence of high prestige and education goals, as well as their positive development, can drive success. 

“Adolescents who endorsed higher levels of prestige and education goals tended to have higher educational attainment, income, occupational creativity, occupational prestige and job complexity after 12 years,” reports Rodica Damian, associate professor of psychology in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. The paper’s first author, Andreea Sutu, is a former graduate student of Damian’s. Also on the team are former UH assistant professor Kevin Hoff and Sif Einarsdóttir of the University of Iceland.  

No prior studies have investigated associations between life goal development and educational or occupational outcomes. 

Damian and colleagues found that goals fluctuate – some dreams and goals of youth fall away while some, related to family (like being close to your relatives), relationships (like having good friendships or a romantic partner) and community (like being involved in your neighborhood or helping others) stay strong. These goals might become even more significant as people get older. 

“Life goals are expected to change over time and these changes are expected to have consequences for future life outcomes, including occupational outcomes,” said Damian. “By understanding how changes in life goals relate to educational and occupational outcomes (above and beyond adolescent levels), we show how changes within individuals may also predict desired educational and occupational attainment.” 

The study examined how life goals developed with age and how adolescent levels of goals, and their development through young adulthood, related to educational attainment and occupational outcomes in young adulthood. The study used two nationally representative samples of Icelandic youth followed longitudinally across 12 years from late adolescence to young adulthood.    

“For educational attainment, the strongest effects were found for education goals. Both initial levels and slopes of education goals were positively associated with educational attainment in both samples,” said Damian. “This indicates that adolescents with higher education goals, and those who showed a more positive change pattern in education goals, had higher educational attainment in young adulthood.” 

Education and prestige goals emerged as the most consistent predictors of later income and that changes in these goals across time were the most consistent predictors of later occupational prestige and complexity. 

“Our work highlights the importance of better understanding sources of goal development in adolescence and young adulthood. Overall, our focus on life goal development, educational attainment and occupational outcomes informs theoretical and practical understanding about the importance of life goals for real-world outcomes,” said Damian.   

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JOURNAL

Journal of Personality and Social Psychology

ARTICLE TITLE

Life goal development, educational attainment, and occupational outcomes: A 12-year, multisample longitudinal study

 

Book aims to re-design the up-skilling game. Rotman School author says we need a re-set in the way we think about human skill in the genAI era

UNIVERSITY OF TORONTO, ROTMAN SCHOOL OF MANAGEMENT

 

IMAGE: 

A NEW BOOK, SOFT SKILLS: HOW TO SEE, MEASURE AND DEVELOP THE SKILLS THAT MAKE US UNIQUELY HUMAN, BY A PROFESSOR AT THE UNIVERSITY OF TORONTO’S ROTMAN SCHOOL OF MANAGEMENT AIMS TO ‘CHANGE THE SOFT SKILLS GAME’ BY INTRODUCING LANGUAGE, MODELS, FRAMEWORKS AND TOOLS FOR IDENTIFYING AND DESCRIBING THEM, MEASURING THE DEGREE TO WHICH A PERSON POSSESSES THEM, SELECTING THOSE WHO POSSESS THEM IN THE UTMOST FROM THOSE LESS SKILLED, AND WAYS OF HELPING STUDENTS AND EXECUTIVES ALIKE DEVELOP THEM, THROUGH A METHODOLOGY THAT HAS BEEN DESIGNED AND PRACTICED FOR THE PAST TEN YEARS. THE BOOK OFFERS ONE OF THE FIRST SYSTEMATIC ANALYSES OF THE ROLE OF LARGE LANGUAGE MODELS IN BOTH AUGMENTING AND AUTOMATING HUMAN TASKS IN ORGANIZATIONS AND RE-DESIGNING THE WORKFLOW OF TEACHING AND LEARNING IN HIGHER EDUCATION AND TACKLES HEAD-ON THE DISTINCTION BETWEEN QUINTESSENTIALLY HUMAN AND MACHINE-REPLICABLE SKILLS.  MIHNEA MOLDOVEANU, THE MARCEL DESAUTELS PROFESSOR OF INTEGRATIVE THINKING AT THE UNIVERSITY OF TORONTO'S ROTMAN SCHOOL OF MANAGEMENT, ARGUES WE NEED A ‘RE-SET’ IN THE WAY WE THINK ABOUT HUMAN SKILL AND IN PARTICULAR THE WAYS WE THINK ABOUT THOSE HUMAN SKILLS WHICH CANNOT BE SUB-CONTRACTED TO AN ALGORITHM RUNNING ON SILICON. THIS BOOK AIMS TO PROVIDE THAT RE-SET.

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CREDIT: MIHNEA MOLDOVEANU

April 22, 2024

Book Aims to Re-Design the Up-Skilling Game. Rotman School Author Says We Need a Re-Set in the Way We Think About Human Skill in the GenAI era

Toronto – Although communicative and relational skills are currently in the greatest demand in organizations large and small, we are as educators, executives, and talent developers very far away from the kind of precision in identifying, measuring, selecting, and developing these skills that we have achieved with cognitive and technical skills. At the same time, the automation of human tasks has placed a sharp light on the ‘quintessentially human skills’ those that cannot and in some cases should not be subject to algorithmic automation. A new book, Soft Skills: How to See, Measure and Develop the Skills that Make us Uniquely Human, by a professor at the University of Toronto’s Rotman School of Management aims to ‘change the soft skills game’ by introducing language, models, frameworks and tools for identifying and describing them, measuring the degree to which a person possesses them, selecting those who possess them in the utmost from those less skilled, and ways of helping students and executives alike develop them, through a methodology that has been designed and practiced for the past ten years. The book offers one of the first systematic analyses of the role of Large Language Models in both augmenting and automating human tasks in organizations and re-designing the workflow of teaching and learning in higher education and tackles head-on the distinction between quintessentially human and machine-replicable skills.

Mihnea Moldoveanu, the Marcel Desautels Professor of Integrative Thinking, argues we need a ‘re-set’ in the way we think about human skill and in particular the ways we think about those human skills which cannot be sub-contracted to an algorithm running on silicon. This book aims to provide that re-set.

Soft Skills: How to See, Measure and Build the Skills that Make Us Uniquely Human is published by De Gruyter.

Mihnea Moldoveanu is the Marcel Desautels Professor of Integrative Thinking, and a professor of economic analysis and policy at the Rotman School. He is the founder and academic director of Rotman Digital, which provides support to Rotman faculty and staff on the design and development of online courses and director of the Desautels Centre for Integrative Thinking, a research, design, and development hub re-engineering the future of learning. He is the Founder and Academic Director of the Rotman School’s Self Development Lab and Leadership Development Lab, which are globally recognized for pioneering feedback based and AI-assisted methods for helping students and executives learn skills that are not easily teachable. As a successful high technology entrepreneur, he was the founder and past CEO CTO of Redline Communications Inc. (4G base stations) and Hefaistos Inc (broadband modems). He is an advisor to the UN on the effects of GenAI on global youth employment.

Bringing together high-impact faculty research and thought leadership on one searchable platform, the Rotman Insights Hub offers articles, podcasts, opinions, books and videos representing the latest in management thinking and providing insights into the key issues facing business and society. Visit www.rotman.utoronto.ca/insightshub.

The Rotman School of Management is part of the University of Toronto, a global centre of research and teaching excellence at the heart of Canada’s commercial capital. Rotman is a catalyst for transformative learning, insights and public engagement, bringing together diverse views and initiatives around a defining purpose: to create value for business and society. For more information, visit www.rotman.utoronto.ca

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For more information:

Ken McGuffin

Manager, Media Relations

Rotman School of Management

University of Toronto

E-mail:mcguffin@rotman.utoronto.ca

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DOI

10.1515/9783111055527 

 

Bonobos aren’t as peace-loving as we thought

Males engage in more acts of aggression than chimps

Peer-Reviewed Publication

HARVARD UNIVERSITY

 

IMAGE: 

A BONOBO NAMED JACKSON AT THE KOKOLOPORI BONOBO RESERVE, DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC OF THE CONGO. 

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CREDIT: LUKAS BIERHOFF / KOKOLOPORI BONOBO RESEARCH PROJECT

The endangered bonobo, the great ape of the Central African rainforest, has a reputation for being a bit of a hippie. Known as more peaceful than their warring chimpanzee neighbors, bonobos live in matriarchal societies, engage in recreational sex, and display signs of cooperation both inside and outside their immediate social groups.

But this relaxed reputation isn’t quite reality, according to a new Harvard study in Current Biology. Observing bonobos and chimps in their natural environments over roughly three years, researchers found that actual rates of aggressive acts among male bonobos were notably higher than among male chimps.

“These findings draw a much more nuanced picture of the use of different forms of aggression in our closest living relatives,” said senior author Martin Surbeck, professor in the Department of Human Evolutionary Biology, who conducted the field study with first author Maud Mouginot, Michael Wilson, and Nisarg Desai of the University of Minnesota.

The researchers point to the different ways “aggression” can be defined and measured. Males of the two species exhibit consistently contrasting patterns of aggression: male chimpanzees sexually coerce females and sometimes kill their male competitors; in contrast, male bonobos exhibit less of this sexual coercion and have never been reported to kill a competitor.

But when looking at overall rates of aggression, which constitute acts that don’t necessarily result in injuries, bonobos overtook chimps. Using 14 community-years of data (years multiplied by number of communities observed), the researchers found that male bonobos engaged in about three times the number of aggressive acts toward other male bonobos than chimps did, even when limiting for only “contact aggression” – physical violence, as opposed to charging or chasing. Observations between females and males were less surprising: as expected, given that females often outrank males in bonobo communities, bonobos exhibited lower rates of male-female aggression and higher rates of female-male aggression than chimps.

In other words, when chimps are aggressive, they’re aggressive to a more lethal degree. But bonobos, you could say, engage in more frequent, less intense squabbling.

The researchers think these comparisons may boil down to different ways chimps and bonobos evolved to form coalitions. Chimps depend heavily on the strength of their male coalitions to defend territories and achieve reproductive success by mating with fertile females. Infighting within those coalitions thus “costs” chimps more, so they do it with less frequency.

Bonobos are more independent, less in need of strong coalitions, so they can “afford” to fight more and risk group strife, with less at stake for their reproductive success, according to Surbeck.

“I think what this study reminds us to do is be more specific and more nuanced about understanding that there are different types of aggression, which may underlie different selection pressures,” Surbeck said.

For the study, the researchers and their local partners on the ground observed three bonobo communities in the Kokolopori Bonobo Reserve in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and two chimpanzee communities at Gombe National Park in Tanzania.

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JOURNAL

Current Biology

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Observational study

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

Animals

ARTICLE TITLE

Differences in expression of male aggression between wild bonobos and chimpanzees