Tag Archives: university

Less Wait Time for Safe Travel Could Reduce Drinking and Driving in People with ‘Urgency’ Personality Trait, Says MU Researcher

By Guest PostNovember 21, 2012Sciencealcohol, city, columbia, degree, denis mccarthy, drinking, driving, emotional state, expression, impulsive behavior, impulsive characteristics, impulsivity, kim dude, missouri, negative, perseverance, personality traits, positive, risk, self control, taxi, university, urgency, young adults

COLUMBIA, Mo. — Saving bar patrons’ time on their commute home could save lives. A pair of studies by University of Missouri psychologists found that people who reported drinking and driving also exhibited “urgency,” or a lack of emotional self-control, especially while drinking. This suggests that some people when intoxicated may be more likely to choose the convenience of driving themselves home instead of waiting for a taxi, said Denis McCarthy, associate professor of psychology at MU.

“Our study correlated urgency, a specific type of impulsivity, to drinking and driving,” McCarthy said. “Individuals with a high degree of urgency tend to act impulsively when they are in both positive and negative emotional states. By looking at personality traits that correlate with drinking and driving, we can help people understand how their personalities might incline them to choose the risk of driving after drinking. Once a person knows this, they can decide to take extra care to moderate their drinking or be prepared to call a cab, hop on a bus or ask a designated driver for help.” (more…)

Can Life Emerge on Planets Around Cooling Stars?

By Guest PostNovember 20, 2012Scienceastronomers, astrophysics, brown dwarf, earth, Germany, habitable zone, heating phenomenon, ingredients, leibniz institute, life, liquid, nuclear burning, phase, planets, potsdam, rene heller, rory barnes, runaway greenhouse, sun, support, university, venus, Washington

Astronomers find planets in strange places and wonder if they might support life. One such place would be in orbit around a white or brown dwarf. While neither is a star like the sun, both glow and so could be orbited by planets with the right ingredients for life.

No terrestrial, or Earth-like planets have yet been confirmed orbiting white or brown dwarfs, but there is no reason to assume they don’t exist. However, new research by Rory Barnes of the University of Washington and René Heller of Germany’s Leibniz Institute for Astrophysics Potsdam hints that planets orbiting white or brown dwarfs will prove poor candidates for life. (more…)

Fishing for Answers off Fukushima

By Guest PostNovember 19, 2012Environmentcatastrophic damage, cesium, contaminated sediment, contamination, dai ichi, earthquake, fish, fukushima, fukushima prefecture, implication, Japan, japanese coast, japanese public, ken buesseler, maff, marine environment, mitsuo uematsu, northeast, northwest, nuclear power plant, ocean, pacific ocean, public health, radiation, radiation level, radioactive isotope, radionuclides, reactor site, release, seafloor, seaweed, shellfish, tokyo, triple disaster, tsunami, university, world

Japan fisheries data provides a look at how the ocean is faring 18 months after the worst accidental release of radiation to the ocean in history

Japan’s “triple disaster,” as it has become known, began on March 11, 2011, and remains unprecedented in its scope and complexity. To understand the lingering effects and potential public health implications of that chain of events, scientists are turning to a diverse and widespread sentinel in the world’s ocean: fish.

Events on March 11 began with a magnitude 9.0 earthquake, the fourth largest ever recorded. The earthquake in turn spawned a massive 40-foot tsunami that inundated the northeast Japanese coast and resulted in an estimated 20,000 missing or dead. Finally, the wave caused catastrophic damage to the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear power plant, resulting in the largest accidental release of radiation to the ocean in history, 80 percent of which ended up in the Northwest Pacific Ocean. (more…)

Technology in the Classroom

By Guest PostNovember 17, 2012Educationaudio, chrystalla mouza, concept, delaware, digital book, electronic text, Environment, fred hofstetter, future educator, graphics, hyperlinks, information, ipad, kindle, learn by doing, multimodal text, multiple modes, rachel karchmer klein, teaching, university, video, website

Teaching future educators how to read and write in a new way

Rachel Karchmer-Klein, an associate professor in the University of Delaware’s School of Education, is teaching future educators to read and write multimodal texts, which includes everything from literature on a Kindle or iPad to information on a website.

“With traditional texts we teach students to read left to right, top to bottom, but electronic text is different because it contains multiple modes,” Karchmer-Klein explained. (more…)

Q&A: Assoc. Prof. Christopher Berry discusses rise of women in Congress

By Guest PostNovember 17, 2012Politicscharisma, Chicago, christopher berry, congress, congresswomen, federal aid, federal projects, female, fiscal cliff, harris school, healthcare reform, house, hurricane sandy, job performance, legislation, male counterpart, nov election, number, partisan gaps, politicians, President Obama, public policy, representatives, university, us senate, us senators, women

One of the most notable outcomes of the Nov. 6 election was the record number of women voted into Congress, including 20 women who will occupy seats in the U.S. Senate.

Christopher Berry, associate professor at the University of Chicago Harris School of Public Policy, recently discussed the effects of the increase in female U.S. senators. Berry co-authored a 2011 study that found congresswomen consistently outperform their male counterparts on several measures of job performance.

What implications will the increase of female representation have for the U.S. Senate?

Potentially of great interest to the constituents of the new female senators is our finding that they consistently bring home more federal projects and federal aid than their male counterparts. When you think about disasters like Hurricane Sandy, the ability to bring home federal aid for rebuilding efforts is really important. It is going to be good for their constituents and the states they represent. (more…)

Degraded Military Lands To Get Ecological Boost From CU-led Effort

By Guest PostNovember 16, 2012Environmentamerican west, arid ecosystem, arid land, atmospheric dust, bacteria, biocrusts, biological soil crust, boulder, central america, China, colorado, cyanobacteria, degraded, desert environment, dugway proving ground, erosion, extreme environment, ferran garcia pichel, fort bliss, fungi, general george patton, hawaii, inoculation, jayne belnap, lichens, metropolitan area, michael duniway, microbial communities, military activity, military exercises, military installation, military vehicles, modeling, mojave desert, mosses, new mexico, nichole barger, northwest utah, pollutant, polyacrylamide, probability, restore, sasha reed, soil erosion, soil fertility, soil surface, South Africa, south america, survival, texas, university, water retention, word war

Some arid lands in the American West degraded by military exercises that date back to General George Patton’s Word War II maneuvers in the Mojave Desert should get a boost from an innovative research project led by the University of Colorado Boulder.

Headed up by CU-Boulder Assistant Professor Nichole Barger, the research team is focused on developing methods to restore biological soil crusts — microbial communities primarily concentrated on soil surfaces critical to decreasing erosion and increasing water retention and soil fertility. Such biological soil crusts, known as “biocrusts,” can cover up to 70 percent of the ground in some arid ecosystems and are dominated by cyanobacteria, lichens, mosses, fungi and bacteria, she said. (more…)

Want Better Employees? Get Somebody Else To Rate Their Personalities, Suggests New Study.

By Guest PostNovember 16, 2012Economyassessment, business, co worker, current employees, evaluation tool, job, maastricht university, michael scott, performance, personality test, phenomenon, potential, predictive, self rated, the office, toronto, university, ute huelsheger

TORONTO, ON – Businesses will get more accurate assessments of potential and current employees if they do away with self-rated personality tests and ask those being assessed to find someone else to rate them, suggest results from a new study.

Previous job performance studies have shown that outsiders are best at rating an individual’s personality in terms of how they work on the job. But observers in these studies have always been co-workers. (more…)

IBM Makes $4 Billion in Financing Available for Business Partners; Announces New Mobile App to Speed Access to Credit within Minutes

By Guest PostNovember 15, 2012Technologyanalytics, android mobile device, bishop company, business challenge, business partners, China, client, cloud, credit qualified, global financing, gracious home, ibm, ibm study, ipad, iPhone, mark hennessy, new york, oxford, puresystems, retailer, united states, university, vai analytics system, zobrist consulting

Extends Financing to Help Businesses Drive Growth with Advanced Technologies: Cloud, Business Analytics and PureSystems

ARMONK, N.Y. – 15 Nov 2012: IBM announced today it is providing IBM Business Partners worldwide with $4 billion in financing for credit-qualified clients over a period of 12 months. This financing, through IBM Global Financing, can make obtaining credit easier and more accessible to enable IBM’s global partner ecosystem and their clients to acquire advanced technologies such as cloud, analytics and PureSystems. As part of today’s news, IBM is also launching a new mobile app as another step to simplify the way IBM’s Business Partners can apply for and secure financing for their clients within minutes via any mobile device — anytime, anywhere.

With 10 billion mobile devices forecasted by 2020, the proliferation of mobile technology is fundamentally changing the way people think, work, act, and interact.¹ Already, 90 percent of mobile users keep their device within arm’s reach at all times, and complete many kinds of transactions across these smart devices. ²The new mobile app from IBM Global Financing is designed to address this changing business environment by making it easier for IBM Business Partners to provide their clients with price proposals and generate credit approvals within minutes using an iPad, iPhone or Android mobile device. The mobile app will be available in the United States this month and will be rolled out globally beginning in China in January 2013. The app has an easy-to-use interface and is designed for contracts worth up to $500K, all while the IBM Business Partner seller is on the go. This mobile app is based on IBM Global Financing’s simple Rapid Online Financing tool, designed for non-financing experts, where available, to generate fast approvals for credit applications with a simple click of the mouse. (more…)