Digital Commons Network^™

Designing Contract Modification, Albert H. Choi, George G. Triantis

Articles

For long-term commercial contracts, modification tends to be the norm rather than the exception. While modification often takes place in response to an arrival of new information, contracting parties frequently modify the terms in response to a shift in bargaining power. In this Article, we explain how the flexibility to renegotiate in response to a shift in bargaining power can facilitate long-term contracting and thereby beneficial reliance investments and risk allocation. The prospect of modification can induce contracting parties who expect their bargaining power to improve, such as from the emergence of outside opportunities, to enter into contracts earlier and …

The End Of Territoriality?, Reuven S. Avi-Yonah

Articles

The One Big Beautiful Big Act (OBBBA) of 2025 is generally consideredto be a continuation of the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (TCJA) of 2017.1Thatis definitely true as far as the individual tax provisions are concerned, be-cause the OBBBA merely made permanent the TCJA provisions with minorchanges, such as increasing the cap on the state and local tax deduction from$10,000 to $40,000. For the corporate tax, the OBBBA continued some of thechanges in the TCJA (such as expensing) while relaxing others (such as amorti-zation of research and experimentation (R&E) expenditures and a stricter limiton interest deductions) without changing the overall …

The Durability Of Protections Against Abuse At Interpol Amidst Rising Authoritarian Pressures, Kristina Daugirdas

Articles

Over centuries and across continents, authoritarian governments have demonstrated a large appetite for international cooperation to target political opponents across borders. In 1851, the “first modern police organization”—the Police Union of German States, whose members included Austria and Prussia—was established “with the express purpose of policing the political opposition of established autocratic regimes.” During the 1970s and early 1980s, military regimes in South America participated in a secret scheme known as Operation Condor to coordinate their efforts to suppress subversion. A recent analysis of twenty-nine “hard authoritarian” regional organizations found that twenty-five were engaged in police cooperation. The Shanghai Cooperation …

Covid And The Great Retrenchment, Samuel R. Bagenstos

Articles

The past six years have seen two dramatic shifts in federal health and benefits policy. First, during the COVID pandemic, the government dramatically expanded public benefits. These expansions had incredibly positive effects, and recipients were largely satisfied with them. But after a relatively short time, Congress rolled back nearly all of the expansion. Worse, the immediate pullback set the stage for even more significant retrenchments in the second Trump Administration. Where in 2023 the United States came closest to universal health care in its history—with a record low uninsured rate of 7.7%—the Trump Administration’s Medicaid cuts and failure to extend …

State Climate Superfunds, Rachel Rothschild

Articles

The harmful effects of climate change have already arrived in cities and states across America, with disasters increasing markedly in recent years along with more gradual environmental changes like sea-level rise and drought. To protect populations and natural resources, significant funding will be necessary for preventative measures as well as disaster response.

At present, it is states and ordinary taxpayers who must shoulder the enormous costs and planning for climate adaptation. A number of state legislators, however, have recently proposed enacting new laws that would require the companies who have most profited from fossil fuel usage to assist in funding …

What's The Point Of Reparation?, Daniel Fryer

Articles

Despite its ancient history in philosophical and legal thought, importance to progressive social movements, and relative simplicity as a notion of fairness—if you break something, you ought to fix it—reparative justice is largely misunderstood. This is problematic given increasing calls for reparation from historically disadvantaged groups. Rather than assessing the validity of these claims, this Article addresses a fundamentally antecedent issue: what’s the point of reparation? Rejecting arguments that claim reparation is about compensation, supplementing distributive justice, and reconciliation, I argue that the point of reparation is to repair unjust social relations created by past wrongdoing. The relational theory of …

Noneconomic Tort Damages And Biased Beliefs About Vulnerability To Harm, Roseanna Sommers

Articles

The American tort system aspires to provide fair compensation to injured plaintiffs, regardless of socioeconomic status, race, religion, or gender. Recent experimental evidence from psychology suggests, however, that factfinders consistently judge identical harms as less severe when experienced by individuals of lower socioeconomic status (SES). People presume, for instance, that a paper cut hurts a wealthy person more than a less well-off person, that domestic violence inflicts greater suffering on a high-SES woman than a lower-SES woman, and that bullying harms a fiveyear- old from a high-SES family more severely than one from a low- SES family. This Essay examines …

Interpretive Facts: Textualism, Empiricism, And The Law-Fact Divide, Hannah Walser

Articles

This Article offers the first systematic examination of where empirical linguistic evidence should fit in the federal court system's division of labor based on law and fact. I begin by identifying interpretive facts : generalized empirical evidence about how a particular word or phrase has been used by a population of speakers, understood by a population of listeners, or both. Thanks to technological advances in corpus linguistics permitting the quantitative analysis of large numbers of texts, as well as methodological shifts that frame ordinary meaning as an empirical question, such facts are increasingly prominent in statutory and constitutional interpretation cases. …

The Basis Of The Labor Exemption Reconsidered, Sanjukta Paul

Articles

Broadly speaking, this symposium queries the question of expanding some actors’ coordination rights under antitrust law as a way of effectuating legal goals relating to “power relations.” I commend the organizers of the symposium for opening this conversation, for asking about the use of “collective bargaining” beyond the traditional labor domain, and for taking on the question in a creative way. These broader questions are essential, and yet my own article will (paradoxically, perhaps) try to contribute to this effort by going back to the core domain of the labor exemption itself—where, it turns

Read But Not Understood? An Empirical Analysis Of Consumer Comprehension In Homeowners Insurance, Daniel Schwarcz, Brenda J. Cude, Kyle D. Logue, German Marquez Alcala

Articles

Modern contract law assumes that consumers meaningfully assent to the standard forms that govern their daily lives. However, this assumption is widely regarded as a legal fiction for two key reasons: first, most consumers do not read standard forms, and second, even those who do often struggle to fully comprehend their terms and implications. Although the lack of consumer reading has been well documented through empirical research, consumers’ ability to comprehend standard-form contracts has received surprisingly little attention.

This Article addresses the latter issue by empirically examining whether providing excerpts from the dominant standard-form homeowners insurance policy improves consumer understanding …

Crypto Kleptocracy, W. Robert Thomas, Jeffery Y. Zhang

Michigan Law Review Online

Many Americans are worrying about whether they will soon be living in a postdemocracy autocracy. But in the meantime, they may already be living in a crypto-fueled kleptocracy. Less than one year into his second presidential term, Donald Trump has reportedly taken his wealth to new heights by embracing, both as a businessman and a politician, the crypto industry. Trump’s family businesses are involved in minting Trump-themed meme coins, creating America- themed stablecoins, and mining crypto assets—so successfully that most of Trump’s wealth is likely now from crypto, not real estate. All the while, the Trump Administration is rolling back …

Axial Length To Corneal Curvature Ratio Is Insufficient For Detecting Pseudomyopia In Children: A Multi-Cohort Study, The Cream-Kids Consortium, Huyen T. Bui, Dirk J. Van Hemert, Tianli Peng, Shuhui Yang, Hai Yen T. Nguyen, Hannah Noor, Siofra C. Harrington, Sander C.M. Kneepkens, Lene A. Hagen, Craig S. Walker, Edward Mallen, Matthew Cufflin, Rigmor C. Baraas, Neema Ghorbani-Mojarrad, Olavi Pärssinen, Louise Terry, Shi Ming Li, Amanda N. French, Jason C. Yam, Caroline C.W. Klaver, Jeremy A. Guggenheim

Research Outputs: 2025-Present

Purpose: Pseudomyopia is an accommodative disorder that can be identified by the difference between pre- and post-cycloplegic refractive error. The current study aimed to evaluate whether the axial length to corneal curvature (AL/CR) ratio, in conjunction with non-cycloplegic refractive error, can reliably identify pseudomyopia in children, thus avoiding the need for cycloplegia. Methods: Refractive error and biometry data from longitudinal studies based in Denmark (n = 645; age 7–17 years) and China (Anyang Childhood Eye Study; n = 2487; age 6–13 years) were used to train separate linear mixed models for children of European or East Asian ancestry, respectively, with …

Ocular Dominance Is Associated With Interocular Asymmetry In Refractive Error And Axial Length Across Childhood And Early Adulthood, Síofra C. Harrington, Gareth Lingham, James Loughman, Ian Flitcroft, David A. Mackey, Michael Moore

Research Outputs: 2025-Present

Purpose: To determine whether ocular dominance is associated with systematic interocular asymmetry in spherical equivalent refraction (SER) and axial length (AL) across childhood and early adulthood, and assess whether such asymmetry exceeds laterality effects. Methods: Data were analysed from three population-based cohorts: 728 children (6–7-year-olds) and 898 adolescents (12–13-year-olds) from Ireland and 303 young adults (25–30-year-olds) from Western Australia. Ocular dominance was assessed using sighting tests. SER was measured by cycloplegic autorefraction and AL by optical biometry. Interocular differences were evaluated using paired comparisons, concordance correlation coefficients (CCC), Deming regression, Bland–Altman analyses and mediation modelling. Analyses were stratified by refractive …

Beyond Hereditary Xerocytosis: Chronic Hemolysis Due To A Non‑Classic Piezo1 Variant With Sickle Cell Trait As A Potential Modifier, Daniel Üblagger Md, Emily Jacobson, Beamon Agarwal Md, Phd, Jacob Troutman Do

Fellows and Residents

No abstract provided.

A Snapping Surprise, Brian Chan Do, Elliot L Busch Dpm, Megan Ferderber Md

Fellows and Residents

No abstract provided.

Developing A Portable Ultrasound Quick Guide To Enhance Point-Of-Care Training In Primary Care, Gurpreet Bharaj Md, Solomon Saul Do

Fellows and Residents

No abstract provided.

Sheep Industry Pivot Project: Global Comparative Review, James Smith

Research outputs 2022 to 2026

Executive summary: This report forms the first stage of a two-year project led by Edith Cowan University to identify and commercialise new market pathways for Australian sheep products and by-products. The project responds to a period of significant structural change within the industry, most notably the legislated phase-out of live sheep exports by sea by May 2028, which is reshaping market dynamics and supply chain configurations. As an initial global benchmark and review, this report examines international best practice and emerging opportunities to inform industry transition, with the broader project focused on supporting producers and processors to develop and test …

Mental Health Effects Of Post-Intensive Care Syndrome In Adult Acute Respiratory Distress Syndrome Survivors Hospitalized During Or After The Covid-19 Pandemic, Brooke M. Leggiero

Honors Undergraduate Theses

Introduction: Post-Intensive Care Syndrome (PICS) is "new or worsening problems in physical, cognitive, or mental health status arising after a critical illness and persisting beyond acute care hospitalization.” This study examined the prevalence of PICS mental health conditions in adult ARDS survivors hospitalized between 2020 and 2025 and differences in mental health conditions between those hospitalized during and after the COVID-19 pandemic.

Methods: This retrospective, descriptive, cross-sectional study enrolled adult survivors hospitalized between 2020 and 2025 who required mechanical ventilation and were at least 1 month removed from the intensive care unit (ICU). Individuals with prior brain injury were excluded. …

Active And Dreamy Minds: The Desire To Be Heard In The Girlhood Film Subgenre, Kiersten L. Blaylock

Honors Undergraduate Theses

In a growing digital age it is important to highlight films that shed light on young girls’ sense of self. Within the genre of independent cinema, there are plenty of films that identify themselves as ‘coming-of-age,’ but there is a subgenre within that category that highlights female driven stories that express what it is like to grow up as a girl. Active and Dreamy Minds, an analytical research project, theorizes guidelines for a girlhood subgenre. Four films have been selected and identified as clear-cut examples of what a girlhood film should look, sound, and feel like and examined to …

Making The Implicit Explicit: Leadership In Primary Care Dental Practice, Sally Hanks, Debby R.E. Cotton

Peninsula Dental School

Objectives: This paper reports on research aimed at understanding leadership activities in primary care dental practice, an under-explored area within the extant literature. Methods: The research employed a qualitative, exploratory paradigm, using Video Reflexive Ethnography (VRE) and Activity Theory (AT) to capture the lived experiences of seven participating dentists. Results: The research outlines the ways in which dentists demonstrate leadership skills in their daily work, identifying three interacting activity systems that define leadership in this setting: Patient Care (PC), Running the Surgery (RS), and Running the Practice (RP). Findings emphasise that leadership is directly related to patient care and is …

Educational Interventions To Prepare Undergraduate Students For Out-Of-Hours Practice As A Newly Qualified Doctor In The United Kingdom: A Scoping Review, Alex Gordon, Molly Parkinson, Rosanna Watts, Kamal El-Badawi, Erin Dawson, Rohan Chiktara, Lorna Burns, Nicola Brennan

Peninsula Dental School

Background: In the United Kingdom (UK), newly qualified doctors are routinely responsible for out-of-hours (OOH) care, often managing acutely unwell patients with limited supervision. Despite national recommendations encouraging OOH experience during medical school training, there is no formal curriculum for OOH practice. Objectives: This scoping review aimed to identify the range of educational interventions designed to prepare UK medical students for OOH clinical responsibilities and assess their reported effects on perceived and actual preparedness. Methods: Following Joanna Briggs Institute methodology, a systematic search of seven databases and grey literature sources was conducted. Eligible studies involved UK-based medical students and reported …

A Pilot Study Assessing The Oral Microbiome In Women Of Menopausal Age: Do Oral Nitrate–Reducing Bacteria Play A Role?, Katie Muddiman, Amazon Doble, Abish Stephen, Raul Bescos Garcia, Charlotte Illsley, Tomas Nicholas, Sally Hanks, Lisa Du Toit, Zoe Brookes

Peninsula Dental School

Introduction The links between oral health and female ageing are poorly understood, but many changes occur in the oral cavity of menopausal women that affect quality of life, and few current oral health interventions consider gender as part of their approach. The aim of this pilot study was to test the hypothesis that the oral microbiome and microenvironment change during female ageing and are thus worthy of further consideration both experimentally and clinically. Methods This observational pilot study retrospectively assessed women aged 18 to 89 years (n = 60) attending a UK primary care dental school facility for blood pressure …

Employer Perspectives On Graduates’ Professional Identity Formation In The Workplace, Denise Jackson, Michael Tomlinson

Research outputs 2022 to 2026

Professional identity (PI) is recognised as a crucial dimension in how graduates negotiate the transition to employment and move towards a pathway of sustainable professional development. Perspectives on PI have been derived mainly from higher education students with little attention given to the perspective of employers involved in supporting and supervising graduates in the workplace. Accordingly, the study surveys 339 industry professionals to examine their perceptions of how formed graduates’ PI is at different times after recruitment and the influence of personal, organisational and external factors on identity formation at work. Employers recognised how a well-formed PI enables graduates to …

Early-Life Pathways To Inequalities In Child Mental Health: Evidence From Eight Birth Cohorts, Demetris Avraam, Gabriella Melis, Tim Cadman, Jennie Carson, Marie Aline Charles, Yu Wei Chua, Ahmed Elhakeem, Joaquín Escribano, Veit Grote, Dariusz Gruszfeld, Kathrin Guerlich, Rae-Chi Huang, Jennifer R. Harris, Jesus Ibarluzea, Jordi Julvez, Berthold Koletzko, Ashleigh Lin, Unai Martin, Rosemary Mceachan, Maria Melchior, Phillip Melton, Johanna Thorbjornsrud Nader, Angela Pinot De Moira, Maja Popovic, Simona Porru, Lorenzo Richiardi, Blanca Sarzo, Daniela Schlüter, Jordi Sunyer, Morris Swertz, Elvira Verduci, John Wright, Annick Xhonneux, Tiffany Yang, Daniela Zugna, Anne-Marie Nybo Andersen, Katrine Strandberg-Larsen, David Taylor-Robinson

Research outputs 2022 to 2026

Background: Socioeconomic inequalities in children's emotional and behavioural problems are already present at school entry. We examined associations between early-life socioeconomic conditions and children's externalising and internalising problems and assessed whether early-life risk factors mediated these associations.

Methods: We analysed harmonised individual participant data from eight birth cohorts within the EU Child Cohort Network. Maternal educational level during pregnancy was used as an indicator of early-life socioeconomic conditions (SECs). Scores of children's externalising and internalising problems around school entry age were used as the outcome variables. Inequalities were quantified using the Slope Index of Inequality which captures the difference in …

Factors That Impede Women's Contraceptive Care Needs During And Immediately After Incarceration In New South Wales, Australian. Qualitative Perspectives Of Professional Staff Working With Incarcerated Women, Helene Smith, Mandy Wilson, Basil Donovan, Jocelyn Jones, Tony Butler, Paul Simpson

Research outputs 2022 to 2026

Introduction: Women with a history of incarceration report higher rates of pregnancy and abortion, lower contraception use and poorer birth outcomes compared to other women in the community. This suggests family-planning and reproductive-health needs that are not well served by current models of care. Despite this, little is known about how contraception is provided within Australian carceral settings, or the structural barriers experienced by professional staff working in these environments. We report findings from a qualitative study conducted in New South Wales (NSW), Australia, describing professional staff's views of factors that support or impede women's contraceptive care needs both during …

Fostering Authentic Corporate Social Responsibility Through Place-Based And Relational Methodologies In Mining Governance: A Global Synthesis, Mehran Nejati, Eduardo Ordonez-Ponce, Rumen Rachev, Belen Lopez Vazquez

Research outputs 2022 to 2026

Purpose: As the global economy shifts towards low-carbon development, sustainable mining practices are becoming increasingly vital for balancing resource extraction with environmental and social responsibilities. This study aims to critically evaluate how traditional corporate social responsibility (CSR) frameworks fall short in addressing power asymmetries and territorial impacts, and to explore how place-based and relational methodologies can foster authentic corporate social responsibility (ACSR) in mining governance.

Design/methodology/approach: This review synthesises findings from 77 peer-reviewed studies published between 2015 and 2025, covering diverse global mining contexts. The analysis identifies transformative themes through a qualitative meta-synthesis approach, focusing on governance practices that empower …

From Awareness To Articulation: How Character Strengths Support Wellbeing Literacy In Pre-Service Teachers, Narelle Lemon, Marnie Harris, Rozita Dass, Carli Sanbrook, Rikki James, Tammy Green, Bev Adkin, Gail Berman

Research outputs 2022 to 2026

Teacher wellbeing demands urgent attention given documented attrition and burnout, yet teacher education programmes often treat wellbeing as peripheral to professional preparation. Sustained teacher wellbeing is also linked to enhanced pedagogical efficacy, professional engagement, and the modelling of wellbeing for learners. This study examines how character strengths function as a scaffolding language through which wellbeing literacy, the intentional language to comprehend and compose wellbeing for self and others, is integrated within initial teacher education for pre-service teachers. Six podcast episodes from the Teachers Supporting Teachers series captured conversations between pre-service teachers and university academics exploring character strengths understanding and enactment. …

From Flexibility To Friction: Intended And Unintended Consequences Of Hot-Desking In Workplaces, Cheuk Hang Au, Lin Yue, Siqi Gao, Guanglei Cheng

Research outputs 2022 to 2026

Purpose: This study aims to theorize the tensions of hot-desking. Moving beyond its surface-level effects, we explain its complex impact on employee well-being and organizational conflict.

Design/methodology/approach: Using a multi-platform netnographic approach, we analyzed unsolicited discussions from online communities to capture diverse, authentic experiences across Eastern and Western contexts.

Findings: Grounded in technology affordance and constraints theory (TACT), our central finding is that hot-desking's affordances and constraints are dynamically co-produced. The organizational affordance of space efficiency is directly experienced by employees as a constraint of spatial insecurity and resource deprivation. This core tension fuels emergent social conflicts, such as senior …

From Gameful Affordances To Lasting Engagement: Deepening Customer-Brand Connections In Mobile Environments, Tripti Ghosh Sharma, Ankit Kesharwani, Preeti Tak, Sanjit K. Roy, Ameet Pandit

Research outputs 2022 to 2026

Purpose: The purpose of this study is to examine how gamification affordances embedded in m-commerce platforms influence gameful experiences (GX) and, in turn, sustained user engagement (SUE). It also explores how customer expertise moderates the GX–SUE relationship, addressing the need for more nuanced models that explain differential user responses to gamified digital environments.

Design/methodology/approach: Grounded in affordance theory, this study models four gamification affordances (achievement, identity, competition and self-expression), and their effects on six GX dimensions. Next, drawing from self-determination theory, the study tests the impact of these six dimensions on sustained user engagement. Finally, rooted in goal orientation theory, …

Governing Professional Mobility: An Llm-Assisted Framework And Empirical Taxonomy Of Health-Professional Mobility Agreements, David C. Benton, Andrew D. Benton

Research outputs 2022 to 2026

Background: Health-professional mobility agreements (eg, compacts, mutual recognition arrangements, memoranda of understanding) are increasingly used to address workforce shortages, support crossborder practice, and enable new technology-mediated modes of service delivery. Regulators need rapid, reproducible ways to assess whether such instruments protect the public while facilitating proportionate professional mobility.

Purpose: To develop and internally test a 10-dimension, 41-subdimension assessment framework for health-professional mobility agreements; examine whether large language model (LLM)–assisted coding can approximate expert legal regulatory assessment; and derive an empirical taxonomy of mobility and other similar instruments.

Methods: A focused documentary synthesis of legal instruments, academic literature, and intergovernmental guidance …