Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

Sustainable Futures-Integrating Indigenous Perspectives Into An Environmental Assessment Framework: An Analysis Of The Mauri Model, Anna Bettini

Journal of Environmental Sustainability

The twin concepts of sustainable development and sustainability have been key points in new policies. Nonetheless, only the Western scientific perspective is typically considered, excluding other voices and leading to a very narrow vision of “sustainability”. The following article investigates the benefits to including indigenous knowledge and principles, considering their values rather than limitations and presents two specific case studies using the Mauri Model Decision Making Framework, a tool applied for environmental assessment, seen as a more cultural-friendly sustainable approach.

Smallholder Farmer Resilience As A Pillar Of Climate-Smart Agriculture: A Review, Michael B. Madin Mr, Daniel Kweku B. Inkoom Professor, Charles A. Bamfo Jr

Journal of Environmental Sustainability

This systematic review synthesizes and assesses scientific literature publications (n=42), to identify and depict the focus of climate change adaptations and resilience research on smallholder farmers in the savannah ecological zone (SAZ). We found substantive studies providing evidence of climate impacts, with adverse consequences on both human and environmental systems. Adaptive actions are being employed to manage the changing conditions as response to climate impacts. Notably, most research efforts are currently restricted to impacts on adaptation, food security, and vulnerability, with a very rare focus on climate resilience and the effects of adaptive actions. Hence, the possible maladaptation outcomes, which …

The Fast And The Curious: Accelerating Literature Reviews With Ai, Jennifer Freer, Natalia Tingle Dolan, Gabrielle Wiersma

Presentations and other scholarship

As the world of academic research shifts gears into the digital age, AI-powered tools are beginning to shape the scholarly landscape. Just as high-performance vehicles transformed the world of car racing, AI-powered tools like scite, Elicit, and Research Rabbit have the potential to revolutionize the traditional literature review process. This presentation will accelerate your understanding of AI literature review tools and how these technologies can turbocharge the research process. Navigating between traditional library tools and AI-powered systems can be like choosing the right vehicle for the race. AI tools can enhance the speed, depth, and breadth of literature reviews, allowing …

A Mathematical Model Of Juvenile Delinquency In The New York State, Oluwasegun Micheal Ibrahim

Articles

This report presents a mathematical model of juvenile delinquency in the New York State. In particular, we develop a juvenile delinquency system of non-linear differential equations using the mathematical epidemiology framework. In constructing this model, we assume that juvenile delinquency can be studied as a socially infectious disease. The stability of the juvenile delinquency-free equilibrium of the model is examined using the standard non-linear dynamical systems theory technique. We carried out a data fitting based on real-life data from the New York State Criminal Justice Services. The research result reveals that the formulated model conforms with the available data and …

Competitive Sustainability: The Intersection Of Sustainability And Business Success, Clyde Eiríkur Hull

Articles

Sustainability that beats the competition is different from sustainability that does not. Some who care very much about sustainability may not care at all about business success. However, they should. If businesses were to see that competitive sustainability leads to financial success, they would take it up and abandon nonsustainable practices

Collaborative Constructions: Designing High School History Curriculum With The Lost & Found Game Series, Owen Gottlieb, Shawn Clybor

Articles

This chapter addresses design research and iterative curriculum design for the Lost & Found games series. The Lost & Found card-to-mobile series is set in Fustat (Old Cairo) in the twelfth century and focuses on religious laws of the period. The first two games focus on Moses Maimonides’ Mishneh Torah, a key Jewish law code. A new expansion module which was in development at the time of the fieldwork described in this article that introduces Islamic laws of the period, and a mobile prototype of the initial strategy game has been developed with support National Endowment for the Humanities. The …

Making Sustainability A Core Competency: Consumer Response To Sustainable Innovative Products, Clyde Eiríkur Hull, Jennifer D. Russell, Monika Kukar-Kinney

Articles

Research suggests that sustainability may not be sufficient to yield a competitive advantage. Building on the resource-based view, this research evaluates three questions: (1) Can using sustainability as a differentiator lead to consumers choosing sustainable products? (2) Does product sustainability appeal more to environmentally concerned consumers? (3) Does product sustainability appeal more when paired with innovation? To test the hypotheses, an online survey of 344 US respondents was conducted. Consumers were given a hypothetical budget for an office chair and asked to choose between two products at a time. Hypotheses were tested with frequency and Chisquare tests and logistic regression. …

“It's So Normal, And … Meaningful.” Playing With Narrative, Artifacts, And Cultural Difference In Florence, Dheepa Sundaram, Owen Gottlieb

Articles

This article considers how player interactions with religious and ethnic markers, create

a globalized game space in the mobile game Florence (2018). Florence is a multiaward-

winning interactive novella game with story-integrated minigames that weave

play experiences into the narrative. The game, in part, explores love, loss, and

rejuvenation as relatable experiences. Simultaneously, the game produces a unique

experience for each player, as they can refract the game narrative through their own

cultural, identitarian lens. The game assumes the shared cultural space of the player,

the player-character (PC), and the non-player-character (NPC) while blurring the

boundaries between each of these …

Gender Barriers To Climate Change Adaptation Practices In Semi-Deciduous Forest Zone Of Ghana, Evans Amoako Amoah, Lawrence Damnyag, Frank Baffour-Ata, Dickson Boateng

Journal of Environmental Sustainability

This study investigated the gender barriers to climate change adaptation practices in the semi-deciduous forest zone of Ghana. A mixed methods approach including household surveys with 210 farmers and 14 focus group discussions was employed in seven selected communities in the Ejisu-Juaben Municipality of the Ashanti Region. The following research questions were answered by the study: (i) What are the climate change adaptation practices implemented by male and female farmers in selected communities of the Ejisu-Juaben Municipality to reduce climate risks? and; (ii) What are the barriers obstructing male and female farmers in implementing climate change adaptation practices in the …

“Temporal Not Permanent:” The Impact Of Covid-19 Cities Lockdown On Improving Air Quality — A Critical Review Of Africa, Emmanuel Mensah Aboagye, Felix Mensah, Kwaku Obeng Effah, Sandylove Afrane, Jeffrey Dankwa Ampah, Selina Annah Brenyah

Journal of Environmental Sustainability

The WHO declared the novel Covid-19 virus a global pandemic shortly after it broke out. The deadly virus spread has affected human health and seriously halted many economic and industrial activities globally. However, there has been a blight as there has generally been an improvement in air quality since the deadly Covid-19 pandemic caused various governments to lockdown their cities to regulate the spread of the virus. Since the widespread of Covid-19, there have been several researches to measure the extent of impact Covid-19 city lockdown has had global air quality, but no critical review has been done in Africa …

Grains Of Gold - Excavating The Perils Of Sand Mining, Oleena Chaudhuri

Journal of Environmental Sustainability

The human population and the global economy have been growing rapidly, increasing resource consumption. This paper evaluates the extent to which sand mining has an impact on the environment. Through a case study and regulatory analysis of India, this paper has attempted to underscore the consequences of excessive sand excavation while highlighting the case of the Indian “sand mafia”. This secondary research evaluation finds that mining of sand resources is a common practice that leads to the destruction of the environment which adversely affects commercial and non-commercial living resources. While studies do point out that economic activities requiring sand as …

What Is A Metaphorical Collocation?, Jakob Patekar

Articles

In research on collocations published in English we encounter, albeit rarely, the use of the notion “metaphorical collocations”. It is interesting to note that seldom if ever are metaphorical collocations defined in any way in these studies, suggesting that researchers find the term self-explanatory. However, seeing that metaphorical collocations are an exciting area of research that is yet to draw attention from the wider community ofresearchers, the aim of this paper is to analyze the current understanding of what a metaphorical collocation is by examining the theoretical foundations as well as studies, specifically those published in English (as the language …

Mixed Reality Prototype Device Showcase: Using Smart Glasses To Enhance Language Access, Aaron Parker, Connor Switenky, Roshan Mathew, Wendy Dannels

Frameless

While the use of American Sign Language (ASL) interpreters and real-time captioning significantly increases deaf individuals’ ability to participate in a wide variety of functions, there are some limitations. The major problem is that current ways of providing communication and information access to deaf people require them to split their attention between the visual focus of the specific content and the interpreter/captioning display. At any given point in time, deaf people are forced to decide what explanation to miss with subsequent effects on topic comprehension and perceptions of the interaction and environments.

Vr Sound Mapping: Make Sound Accessible For Dhh People In Virtual Reality Environments, Ziming Li, Roshan Peiris

Frameless

In-game audio plays an important role in enhancing the sense of reality and immersion in the gaming experience. In many games, sounds are also used to provide notifications and clues, which are essential to the gameplay. However, in this case, the deaf and hard of hearing (DHH) players may fail to access the information conveyed by sounds, which degrades their gaming experience (Jain et al. 2021).

Creating A Virtual Reality Experience In Service To A Non-Profit Agency, Frank Deese, Susan Lakin, Isabelle Anderson

Frameless

In the summer of 2018, RIT Professors Susan Lakin and Frank Deese discussed with the principal officers of the Society for the Protection and Care of Children (SPCC) in Rochester how the new technology of Virtual Reality might be used to not only impart information to viewers, but generate empathy for those receiving services from the organization as well as those performing those services. Their ultimate goal was to create an experience that could be viewed with VR headsets at fundraising events and on a website using low-cost Google Cardboard.

Vr Sound Mapping: Make Sound Accessible For Dhh People In Virtual Reality Environments, Ziming Li, Roshan Peiris

Frameless

In-game audio plays an important role in enhancing the sense of reality and immersion in the gaming experience. In many games, sounds are also used to provide notifications and clues which are essential to the gameplay. However, in this case, the DHH (deaf and hard of hearing) players may fail to access the information conveyed by sounds, which degrades their gaming experience (Jain et al. 2021).

Protocol For An Ehub As An Systemic Intervention For Homeless Shelter Staff And Resident Psychosocial And Behavioral Needs, Celeste Sangiorgio, Cory Crane, Cassandra Berbery, Caroline Easton

Frameless

This paper includes a proposal and outline for a one- stop, web-based eHub for homeless shelter workers and residents. The shelter eHub is proposed as a one-stop portal for staff and resident skills acquisition, shelter and community resources, and rehearsal of coping skills. The theoretical and empirical support for eHub contents is reviewed, as well as the structure for evidence-based psychological skills building and gamified and virtual skills rehearsal components.

Setting The Scene For Community-Based Learning: Creative Writing As A Platform For Inquiry And Integrative Learning, Adam Watkins

Journal of Creative Writing Studies

Creative writing pedagogy has received a surge of critical interest of late, though much remains to be said about its capacity to support trans-disciplinary learning outcomes, such as those related to community-based learning. Through an assessment of a place-based course focused on community-based learning, this article provides evidence that creative writing assignments can be an effective learning tool for cultivating community engagement and intercultural competencies. The educational value of creative writing, this study shows, has much to do with its unique mode of inquiry, which is well suited for integrating diverse perspectives, multi-modal research, and multiple ways of knowing.

Profiling Food Festivals By Type, Name And Descriptive Content: A Population Level Study, Muhammet Kesgin, Rajendran S. Murthy, Rick Lagiewski

Articles

Purpose: This research aims to classify and describe food festivals and examine the patterns in food festival naming and festival descriptions in online media. Design: This research represents the first population-level empirical examination of food festivals in the United States using a purpose-built dataset (N=2626). Methodology includes text mining to examine food festival communications. Findings: Food festival size varies across local and regional spheres within the country. Food festivals employ geographical (place-, destination-based) associations in their names. Food festivals’ descriptions and online communications showcase a welcoming environment predominantly emphasizing family-oriented and live entertainment experiences. Food festivals across the country show …

A Case Study On Self-Sustainable Villages Of India, Anushka Umesh Sawarkar Miss

Journal of Environmental Sustainability

This case study is written with the purpose of understanding the main causes that led to the development of the mentioned five villages, under the guidance of Padma Bhushan Hon. Shree Anna Saheb Hazare and Padma Shree Hon. Popatrao Pawar. Earlier, these villages suffered from low agriculture output, water deficit leading to low economic output. However today, by adapting the five principles outlined in the study, they were able amplify their economic power sustainably for the whole community. Although the principles are not new, their successful implementation through ingenious techniques and leadership by overcoming usual hurdles and hindrances is what …

Optimization In The Application Of Varnishes Barrier On Cartonboard Packaging, Andre Ramalheiro De Andrade, Maria Isabel Rodrigues Phd, Eduardo Luiz Machado Phd

Journal of Applied Packaging Research

In this work adjustments in the rotogravure printing process are proposed to the varnish water vapor transmission rate (WVTR) aiming to obtain results smaller than 20g/m²/24h. One case study was used for the propositions for improvements, where focused on varnish application process in a gravure printer for an eight-printing unit cartonboard packaging, maximum printing speed of 175 m/min and a 285 g/m² weight cartonboard. The possible variables that influenced the WVTR result were selected from the technical expertise of the people involved in the project, the analysis in the printing process with the application of directed trials using experimental designs …

Nature-Based Tourism Sustainability And Climatic Change Implication In Ikogosi Resort, Southwestern Nigeria, Opeyemi S. Aniramu Mr., Olabiyi O. Coker Mr., Raphael G. Odelola Mr.

Journal of Environmental Sustainability

The implications of climatic changes have been predicted to have devastating effects on biodiversity condition particularly nature-based tourism. In this study, investigation on the climatic characteristics in Ikogosi-Ekiti, Nigeria was conducted. Also, spatio-temporal changes of green and non-green cover were analysed for the study.

Climatic data from Nigeria Meteorological Agency (NIMET) for a period of 1975-2014 were analyzed to reveal the trend of climatic changes using appropriate statistical tool. A 30 meter Landsat image of TM 1991, ETH+ 2002 and OLI 2015 were used for the study. The satellite images were digitally processed using Arcgis10.3 and Fragstat 3.0. Species Diversity …

Ambedo: Immersive Storytelling Through Augmented Reality, Dr. Diane Derr, Law Alsobrook, Sadia Mir

Frameless

The territory of locative media, coupled with augmented reality, offers unique opportunities to excavate and unpack rich historic events, in immersive storytelling. In September of 1943, during World War II, approximately 5,200 Italian soldiers were massacred on the Greek island of Kefalonia by Nazi troops. This massacre is credited as one of the largest ever prisoner-of-war massacres in recent history (Lamb, 1996) and left an indelible mark on the island of Kefalonia. In 2019, Configuring Kommos: Narrative, Event, Place and Memory, an interdisciplinary research project, began an investigation into the triangulation of narrative within the complexity of this tragic …

Projection-Based Ar For Hearing Parent-Deaf Child Communication, Victor N. Antony, Adira Blumenthal, Ziyue Qiu, Ashely Tenesaca, Wanyin Hu, Zhen Bai

Frameless

Deaf infants born to hearing parents are at risk of language deprivation due to lack of sign language fluency and subpar parent-child communication. We present a projection-based Augmented Reality (AR) prototype designed to improve parent-child communication and American Sign Language (ASL) acquisition. Our system aims to non-intrusively augment play episodes by projecting just-in-time and context-aware ASL equivalents extracted from nursery rhymes being sung by parents. This paper presents the initial implementation of the prototype .

The Challenge Of Preserving Captured Sign Language Data In Human Avatar Models, Youmee Lee, Joseph Hill, Andrew Smith

Frameless

No abstract provided.

Using Virtual Reality For Peace Building In Refugee Camps Of Northern Uganda, Barnabas Samuel John, Sebit Martin

Frameless

No abstract provided.

Ikkuma: An Artistic Vr Storytelling Experience, Yangli Liu

Frameless

Ikkuma is an interactive storytelling experience utilizing Tilt Brush and Unity. It is about a land being swallowed by the sea, where conflict cracks ice and fire tears families apart. Ikkuma is the Inuvialuit word for fire, a central element to the work. The fundamental theme of Ikkuma is global warming and its impact on the Arctic ecosystem. The players must learn to tame the fire in their hearts and the Inuit traditional knowledge if they hope to survive the harsh yet fragile Arctic tundra.

Designing Blended Experiences: Laugh Traders Design Fiction, Brian J. Okeefe

Frameless

The increasing ubiquity of interactions that involve complementary digital content, physical objects, and spaces, brings about new challenges for designers. There is a need to embed designs in legacy systems, whether those are existing physical structures or existing digital platforms. Traditional approaches to product design, interaction design, and user experience design often do not take this new context into account. Many systems do not consider how designers produce new digital and physical experiences that work harmoniously, while supporting new interactions and relationships with people (Imaz and Benyon 2007; Jetter, Geyer, Schwarz & Reiterer 2012). To address this, we propose the …

Embodimap Vr. A Tangible And Immersive Body-Mapping Experience., Volker Kuchelmeister, Jill Bennett, Gail Kenning, Natasha Ginnivan, Lydia Gitau, Sophie Burgess

Frameless

EmbodiMap is a creative research and therapeutic tool that enables users to connect with and explore how thoughts, sensationsand emotions are experienced in the body. It extends existing body-mapping research and protocols by facilitating a tangible immersive experience.

How Mixed Reality Will Impact Product Design, Wyatt Coe

Frameless

Mixed reality technology promises to merge our digital and physical worlds, unlocking new realms of experience and design. Designers must consider how this will impact future products and experiences now, to identify the most desirable solutions and applications of this technology. The capability of software to simulate reality could fundamentally shift the way we produce and experience physical and digital products, allowing for simplified physical products that support digital experiences.