Using urban woodlands and forests as places for improving the mental well-being of people with dementia

ABSTRACT

This study investigates the meaning and use of urban woodlands and forests, and how they can contribute to positive mental well-being of people with dementia, by adopting ethnographic, participatory action research and case study approaches. Qualitative research provided knowledge and understanding about how activities in an urban woodland environment can add value to and benefit the lives of people with dementia living independently. Data were collected from semi-structured, and walk-along interviews, as well as from piloting a programme of activities based in an urban woodland setting . Five male participants with dementia, aged between 52 and 83, and one family carer, took part in the pilot programme, based in Scotland (UK). The findings show how through active use of urban woodlands and forests, people with dementia find their experiences to be meaningful. People with dementia found meaning in the multi-sensory experience of the woodland, in their feeling of self-worth, and in their ability to retain a sense of autonomy and identity. The approach to active use of urban woodlands and forests offers a viable alternative to traditional residential and day care activities, as well as an opportunity to promote the quality of life of people with dementia living in their own homes.     

Theoretical activity in sustainable tourism research

There is growing recognition in tourism and sustainable tourism research of the need for a fuller engagement in theoretical activity. The paper examines how different research strategies in recent articles on sustainable tourism have advanced theoretical understanding in this research field. The articles advance thinking through ideas and concepts connected with political ecology, mobilities, transition pathways, and behavioural and systems change. They are evaluated using a typology of research strategies associated with theoretical work, using a broad perspective on this work. The research strategy typology was developed for the paper, and it is explained and illustrated. While the papers on sustainable tourism use a range of strategies associated with theoretical activity, there is only limited engagement with “big” social theories.     

Forecasting economic activity from yield curve factors

This paper provides clear-cut evidence that the slope and curvature factors of the term structure of interest rates (yield curve) contain more information about future changes in economic activity than the term spread itself, often used in the literature as a predictive regressor of economic activity. These two factors reflect different information about future economic activity, which is smoothed out by the term spread. The paper shows that the slope factor has predictive power on future economic activity over longer horizons ahead, and thus may be interpreted as reflecting future business cycle conditions. On the other hand, the curvature factor, which enters the term spread with opposite sign than the slope factor, has predictive power on shorter movements of future economic activity which may be associated with changes in the current stance of monetary policy. These results hold for a number of world developed economies.     

From ‘just a swimmer’ to a ‘swimming mother’: women’s embodied experiences of recreational aquatic activity with pre-school children

Increased academic attention on the gendering of leisure pastimes in recent years has highlighted the centrality of the gendered body in influencing how leisure is accessed, experienced and transformed. To date, however, little attention has been paid to how women experience aquatic leisure activity, the second most popular form of leisure activity in the UK, and where female participation predominates. This paper presents results from research investigating the aquatic leisure experiences of 22 women, with children aged under 3, in the North-East of England. A number of key themes emerged from the data, which highlighted the centrality of the gendered, lived body as a key social construct contouring participant perceptions in the swimming pool environment. Women reflected upon their self-perceived physical deficiencies when wearing revealing swimming costumes, particularly under the critical gaze of ‘other’ bodies, whether present or imagined. The co-presence of other bodies was also central in shaping lived experiences, and the presence of ‘dependent’ children’s bodies shifted bodily intentionality away from the self towards perceived maternal responsibilities and the management of perceived risks, including ‘dirt’ and ‘germs’ and the negotiation of the tacit rules of the swimming pool. Results also suggest that the emphasis on maternal responsibility in aquatic leisure activity and timing of parent-toddler sessions could lead to reproduction of gender inequalities and the exclusion of some fathers from participation.     

试谈素质教育中实践能力的培养

素质教育的目的是全面贯彻党的教育方针,提高国民素质,培养学生的创造精神和实践能力。而实践能力是人的能力的重要成分,是学会做事的具体体现,是学生生存发展的需要。教育要注重知行统一,坚持教育教学与生产劳动、社会实践相结合,增强学生解决实际问题的本领和自主探究学习的能力。     

Monetary policy,endogenous transactions,and financial market segmentation

An endogenous financial market segmentation model is constructed to explore the role of costly credit as a medium of exchange in the monetary policy elasticity of financial market activity. Against inflation risk, credit is an alternative insurance device to a cash transfer from the financial market. In equilibrium, credit reduces the financial market activity rate. Monetary policy has redistributive effects across economic individuals. Inflation may not tax financial market non-participants. However, it may tax financial market participants by increasing the financial market activity rate. Welfare may increase and the optimal money growth rate can be positive.     

ALTERNATIVE WEIGHTING APPROACHES TO COMPUTING INDEXES OF ECONOMIC ACTIVITY

This paper compares the weighting schemes in the traditional, principal component and dynamic factor approaches to summarizing information from a number of component variables. To facilitate the comparison, we propose a framework to discuss the approaches with respect to their implied loadings in a latent variable model. We also propose a way to transform the dynamic factor index into an analogous index which is a weighted average of the components. The framework shows the strengths and weakness of the alternative weighting schemes and the sense in which the dynamic factor approach has the advantage of capturing both the significance and the variability of the components.     

Pure jump models for pricing and hedging VIX derivatives

Recent non-parametric statistical analysis of high-frequency VIX data (Todorov and Tauchen, 2011) reveals that VIX dynamics is a pure jump semimartingale with infinite jump activity and infinite variation. To our best knowledge, existing models in the literature for pricing and hedging VIX derivatives do not have these features. This paper fills this gap by developing a novel class of parsimonious pure jump models with such features for VIX based on the additive time change technique proposed in Li et al., 2016a, Li et al., 2016b. We time change the 3/2 diffusion by a class of additive subordinators with infinite activity, yielding pure jump Markov semimartingales with infinite activity and infinite variation. These processes have time and state dependent jumps that are mean reverting and are able to capture stylized features of VIX. Our models take the initial term structure of VIX futures as input and are analytically tractable for pricing VIX futures and European options via eigenfunction expansions. Through calibration exercises, we show that our model is able to achieve excellent fit for the VIX implied volatility surface which typically exhibits very steep skews. Comparison to two other models in terms of calibration reveals that our model performs better both in-sample and out-of-sample. We explain the ability of our model to fit the volatility surface by evaluating the matching of moments implied from market VIX option prices. To hedge VIX options, we develop a dynamic strategy which minimizes instantaneous jump risk at each rebalancing time while controlling transaction cost. Its effectiveness is demonstrated through a simulation study on hedging Bermudan style VIX options.     

发包方与供应商间关系对供应商创新能力的影响

采用多元层级回归方法,对影响供应商创新能力的驱动因素以及供应商在供应链网络中的等级位置对各驱动因素与供应商创新能力间关系的调节作用进行了理论探讨和实证分析。结果显示:在跨国外包情景下,发包方支持、共享活动和联结强度对供应商的创新能力具有显著的积极影响;供应商在供应链网络中的等级位置对联结强度与供应商创新能力间关系具有显著的正向调节作用,对共享活动与供应商创新能力间关系的正向调节作用不稳定。