Things Fall Apart: Dictatorships, Development, and Democracy in Africa

Recent events in Africa provide evidence of the failure of dictatorships to meet the needs of citizens and serve to debunk a number of development theory assumptions: that democratization is culturally determined, that democratization will follow economic development, and that dictatorships tend to produce durable, stable development. Therefore, the attempt to achieve development without democratization is risky and potentially very costly. We argue that dictatorship in Africa serves a function akin to Myrdal's backwash effects, thwarting economic progress in a cumulative and circular way, and that democratization must become a necessary criterion of engagement with African countries.

Frequent Arousal from Hibernation Linked to Severity of Infection and Mortality in Bats with White-Nose Syndrome

White-nose syndrome (WNS), an emerging infectious disease that has killed over 5.5 million hibernating bats, is named for the causative agent, a white fungus (Geomyces destructans (Gd)) that invades the skin of torpid bats. During hibernation, arousals to warm (euthermic) body temperatures are normal but deplete fat stores. Temperature-sensitive dataloggers were attached to the backs of 504 free-ranging little brown bats (Myotis lucifugus) in hibernacula located throughout the northeastern USA. Dataloggers were retrieved at the end of the hibernation season and complete profiles of skin temperature data were available from 83 bats, which were categorized as: (1) unaffected, (2) WNS-affected but alive at time of datalogger removal, or (3) WNS-affected but found dead at time of datalogger removal. Histological confirmation of WNS severity (as indexed by degree of fungal infection) as well as confirmation of presence/absence of DNA from Gd by PCR was determined for 26 animals. We demonstrated that WNS-affected bats aroused to euthermic body temperatures more frequently than unaffected bats, likely contributing to subsequent mortality. Within the subset of WNS-affected bats that were found dead at the time of datalogger removal, the number of arousal bouts since datalogger attachment significantly predicted date of death. Additionally, the severity of cutaneous Gd infection correlated with the number of arousal episodes from torpor during hibernation. Thus, increased frequency of arousal from torpor likely contributes to WNS-associated mortality, but the question of how Gd infection induces increased arousals remains unanswered.

Parameters of Reform and Unification in Modern Japanese Buddhist Thought: Murakami Senshō and Critical Buddhism

Reform is a word that, one might easily say, characterizes more than any other the history and development of Buddhism. Yet, it must also be said that reform movements in East Asian Buddhism have often taken on another goal—harmony or unification; that is, a desire not only to reconstruct a more worthy form of Buddhism, but to simultaneously bring together all existing forms under a single banner, in theory if not in practice. This paper explores some of the tensions between the desire for reform and the quest for harmony in modern Japanese Buddhism thought, by comparing two developments: the late 19th century movement towards ‘New Buddhism’ (shin Bukkyō) as exemplified by Murakami Senshō 村上専精 (1851–1929), and the late 20th century movement known as ‘Critical Buddhism’ (hihan Bukkyō), as found in the works of Matsumoto Shirō 松本史朗 and Hakamaya Noriaki 袴谷憲昭. In all that has been written about Critical Buddhism, in both Japanese and English, very little attention has been paid to the place of the movement within the larger traditions of Japanese Buddhist reform. Here I reconsider Critical Buddhism in relation to the concerns of the previous, much larger trends towards Buddhist reform that emerged almost exactly 100 years previous—the so-called shin Bukkyō or New Buddhism of the late-Meiji era. Shin Bukkyō is a catch-all term that includes the various writings and activities of Inoue Enryō, Shaku Sōen, and Kiyozawa Manshi, as well as the so-called Daijō-hibussetsuron, a broad term used (often critically) to describe Buddhist writers who suggested that Mahāyāna Buddhism is not, in fact, the Buddhism taught by the ‘historical’ Buddha Śākyamuni. Of these, I will make a few general remarks about Daijō-hibusseturon, before turning attention more specifically to the work of Murakami Senshō, in order to flesh out some of the similarities and differences between his attempt to construct a ‘unified Buddhism’ and the work of his late-20th century avatars, the Critical Buddhists. Though a number of their aims and ideas overlap, I argue that there remain fundamental differences with respect to the ultimate purposes of Buddhist reform. This issue hinges on the implications of key terms such as ‘unity’ and ‘harmony’ as well as the way doctrinal history is categorized and understood, but it also relates to issues of ideology and the use and abuse of Buddhist doctrines in 20th-century politics.

The Effects of Apomorphine on Sexual Behavior and Aggression in Male Golden Hamsters

The general dopamine agonist apomorphine has been shown to have mostly facilitative effects on sexual behavior in rodents (Domingues & Hull, 2005; Bitran & Hull, 1987). A study looking at the effectsof apomorphine on sexual behavior in male golden hamsters observed that after systemic injections of apomorphine the males became aggressive towards the estrous females (Floody, unpublished). Studies on aggressive behavior have shown that apomorphine has facilitative effects on aggression in rodents (Nelson & Trainor, 2007; van Erp & Miczek, 2000; Ferrari, van Erp, Tornatzky, & Miczek, 2003). The studies presented here attempt to unravel the effects that apomorphine has on sexual and aggressive behavior in male golden hamsters. Studies 1, 2, 3, and 4 focused on the effects of apomorphine on aggression and Study 5 focused on the effects of apomorphine on sexual behavior. It was important for the purposes ofthis study to have separate, specific measures of aggression and sexual behavior that did not involve a social context that would involve multiple behaviors and motivations. The measure used to assessaggression was flank marking behavior. The measure used to assess sexual behavior was the number of vocalizations in response to sexual stimuli. The results from Studies 1, 2, and 3 suggested thatapomorphine increased aggressive motivation in a dose-dependent manner. In Studies 1 and 2 there was a high occurrence of stereotyped cheek pouching that interfered with the flank marking behavior. In Study 3 the procedure was modified to prevent cheek pouching and flank marking was observed uninhibited. Study 5 suggested a decrease in vocalizations after apomorphine treatment. However, this decrease may have been a result of the increase in stereotyped licking behavior. Results suggested that systemic apomorphine treatments increase aggressive motivation in hamsters. The increase in aggressive motivation may confuse the perception of the sensory signals that the males receive from the estrous females. They may haveperceived the estrous female as a nonestrous female which they would normally associate with an aggressive interaction (Lehman, Powers, & Winans, 1983).

Trends in the Association Between Socioeconomic Status and Obesity in U.S. Adults: 2002-2012

Since the 1980s, the prevalence of obesity has more than doubled to over 30 percent of the adult population (Thorpe, 2004). Obesity is a key contributing factor to continually rising national healthcare costs. Addressing its negative implications is essential not only from a cost perspective, but also for the betterment of our nation¿s general health and wellbeing. Obesity is reportedly associated with a 35% increase in inpatient and outpatient spending, as well as a 77% increase in related necessary medications (Sturm, 2002). Obesity, which some have argued should be classified as a disease in itself, has roughly the same association with the development of chronic health conditions as does 20 years of aging (Sturm, 2002). Defined as ambulatory care-sensitive conditions, these obesity-related chronic health diagnoses ¿ like diabetes, cardiovascular disease, and hypertension ¿ are in turn the primary drivers of current healthcare spending, as well as future predicted health expenditures. It is well established that lower socioeconomic status (SES) is associated with higher rates of obesity and the subsequent development of aforementioned obesity-related conditions. Socioeconomic status has traditionally been defined by education, income, and occupation (Adler, 2002); however, this study found empirical evidence for education being the most fundamental of these three SES indicators in determining obesity outcomes. For both men and women, as education levels increased, the likelihood of an individual being obese decreased. However, with less education, there was increased disparity between the obesity rates for men and women. Women consistently saw higher rates of obesity and were more impacted in terms of obesity onset by belonging to a lower SES category than men. In addition, this study assessed whether the impact of one¿s socioeconomic status on obesity-related health outcomes (specifically the negative impact low-SES as measured by education level) has changed over time. Results deriving from annual data from the National Health Interview Survey (NHIS) for all years from 2002 to 2012 indicate that the association between low-socioeconomic status and negative health outcomes has not increased in magnitude over the past decade. Instead, obesity rates have increased across the overall U.S. adult population, most likely due to a number of larger external societal factors resulting in increased caloric intake and decreased energy expenditure across every SES group. In addition, while the association between low-SES and obesity has not worsened, a consequence of the Great Recession has been a larger percentage of the U.S. population in lower-SES, which is still consistently subject to the same worse health outcomes.

The Role of Features and Context in Recognition of Novel Melodies

WE INVESTIGATED HOW WELL STRUCTURAL FEATURES such as note density or the relative number of changes in the melodic contour could predict success in implicit and explicit memory for unfamiliar melodies. We also analyzed which features are more likely to elicit increasingly confident judgments of "old" in a recognition memory task. An automated analysis program computed structural aspects of melodies, both independent of any context, and also with reference to the other melodies in the testset and the parent corpus of pop music. A few features predicted success in both memory tasks, which points to a shared memory component. However, motivic complexity compared to a large corpus of pop music had different effects on explicit and implicit memory. We also found that just a few features are associated with different rates of "old" judgments, whether the items were old or new. Rarer motives relative to the testset predicted hits and rarer motives relative to the corpus predicted false alarms. This data-driven analysis provides further support for both shared and separable mechanisms in implicit and explicit memory retrieval, as well as the role of distinctiveness in true and false judgments of familiarity.