The valuation of travel time savings in least developed countries:theoretical and empirical challenges and results from a field study

In developed countries travel time savings can account for as much as 80% of the overall benefits arising from transport infrastructure and service improvements. In developing countries they are generally ignored in transport project appraisals, notwithstanding their importance. One of the reasons for ignoring these benefits in the developing countries is that there is insufficient empirical evidence to support the conventional models for valuing travel time where work patterns, particularly of the poor, are diverse and it is difficult to distinguish between work and non-work activities. The exclusion of time saving benefits may lead to a bias against investment decisions that benefit the poor and understate the poverty reduction potential of transport investments in Least Developed Countries (LDCs). This is because the poor undertake most travel and transport by walking and headloading on local roads, tracks and paths and improvements of local infrastructure and services bring large time saving benefits for them through modal shifts. The paper reports on an empirical study to develop a methodology for valuing rural travel time savings in the LDCs. Apart from identifying the theoretical and empirical issues in valuing travel time savings in the LDCs, the paper presents and discusses the results of an analysis of data from Bangladesh. Some of the study findings challenge the conventional wisdom concerning the time saving values. The Bangladesh study suggests that the western concept of dividing travel time savings into working and non-working time savings is broadly valid in the developing country context. The study validates the use of preference methods in valuing non-working time saving values. However, stated preference (SP) method is more appropriate than revealed preference (RP) method.

Hidden state models for time series

Amongst all the objectives in the study of time series, uncovering the dynamic law of its generation is probably the most important. When the underlying dynamics are not available, time series modelling consists of developing a model which best explains a sequence of observations. In this thesis, we consider hidden space models for analysing and describing time series. We first provide an introduction to the principal concepts of hidden state models and draw an analogy between hidden Markov models and state space models. Central ideas such as hidden state inference or parameter estimation are reviewed in detail. A key part of multivariate time series analysis is identifying the delay between different variables. We present a novel approach for time delay estimating in a non-stationary environment. The technique makes use of hidden Markov models and we demonstrate its application for estimating a crucial parameter in the oil industry. We then focus on hybrid models that we call dynamical local models. These models combine and generalise hidden Markov models and state space models. Probabilistic inference is unfortunately computationally intractable and we show how to make use of variational techniques for approximating the posterior distribution over the hidden state variables. Experimental simulations on synthetic and real-world data demonstrate the application of dynamical local models for segmenting a time series into regimes and providing predictive distributions.

Time and professional work in public sector organisations: an examination of four occupational groups in education and medicine

The aim of this thesis is to examine the experience of time of four professional occupational groups working in public sector organisations and the factors affecting this experience. The literature on time and work is examined to delineate the key parameters of research in this area. A broad organisation behaviour approach to the experience of time and work is developed in which individual, occupational, organisational and socio-political factors are inter-related. The experience of secondary school teachers, further education lecturers, general medical practitioners and hosoital consultants is then examined. Multiple methods of data collection are used: open-ended interviews, a questionnaire survey and the analysis of key documents relating to the institutional settings in which the four groups work. The research aims to develop our knowledge of working time by considering the dimensions of the experience of time at work, the contexts in wlhich this experience is generated and the constraints these contexts give rIse to. By developing our understanding of time as a key feature of work experience we also extend our knowledge of organisation behaviour in general. In conclusion a model of the factors relating the experience of time to the negotiation of time at work is presented.

Gesundheitsrisiken bei Unternehmern

An einer Studie zum Zusammenhang zwischen der Gesundheit von Unternehmern, deren Arbeitsmerkmalen und deren Erfolg nahmen 53 klein- und mittelständische Unternehmer teil. Erfasste Arbeitsmerkmale waren: Handlungs-/Entscheidungsspielraum, Arbeitsintensität, Arbeitszeit, Konkurrenzdruck und Prognose über die Auftragsentwicklung. Der Unternehmenserfolg wurde über das Mitarbeiterwachstum, die Möglichkeit des Unternehmers, von seiner Firma abwesend zu sein (Urlaubstage), und dem erlebten Unternehmenserfolg operationalisiert. Gesundheitsindikatoren waren Depression, Angst, vitale Erschöpfung, Schlafstörungen und Bluthochdruck. Im Vergleich zur Gesamtbevölkerung wiesen die Unternehmer in allen untersuchten Gesundheitsvariablen häufiger Beeinträchtigungen auf. Regressionsanalysen ergaben, dass lange Arbeitszeiten und Konkurrenzdruck mit einer verzögerten Rückstellung des systolischen Blutdrucks (SBD) in der Freizeit und Nacht einhergingen. Alle untersuchten Erfolgsmerkmale waren für die Gesundheit prädiktiv. So war Mitarbeiterwachstum negativ mit dem SBD während der Arbeit sowie Schlafstörungen assoziiert. Je mehr Unternehmenserfolg erlebt wurde, desto geringer waren die Werte für vitale Erschöpfung und Depression. Die Urlaubsdauer war negativ mit Angst und vitaler Erschöpfung korreliert. Insgesamt hatte von den Arbeitsmerkmalen nur die Dauer der Arbeitszeit einen Effekt auf die Gesundheit von Unternehmern. Daneben existieren aber offensichtlich weitere Faktoren, die mit der Unternehmergesundheit in Beziehung stehen. Dies sind neben dem Konkurrenzdruck am Markt insbesondere Indikatoren des Unternehmenserfolgs. The relationship between health and workload as well as entrepreneurial success was analyzed in 53 entrepreneurs. Workload data (decision latitude, job demand, working time, competition, market development) were determined by using structured interviews and Karasek's job content questionnaire. Firm success was operationalized by employee growth, the possibility of absence from the company (days of holiday), and perceived success. Health was measured by questionnaires for sleep disturbances, vital exhaustion, depression, and anxiety, and by 24 hour ambulatory blood pressure monitoring. Regression analyses showed that working time and strength of competition within the market were predictive for systolic blood pressure (SBP) during leisure time and night, but not during work. All variables measuring entrepreneurial success were predictive for health. Employee growth was related to decreasing SBP during work and to fewer sleep disturbances. The duration of holidays was negatively related to vital exhaustion and anxiety. Perceived company success was negatively related to depression and vital exhaustion. In conclusion, only the relationship between working time and bad health conformed to findings reported for the relationship between work and health in employees. However, there were additional indicators, especially indicators of competition and entrepreneurial success, that affected the health of entrepreneurs.

Editorial

The year so far has been a slow start for many businesses, but at least we have not seen the collapse of as many businesses that we were seeing around two years ago. We are, however, still well and truly in the midst of a global recession. Interest rates are still at an all time low, UK house prices seem to be showing little signs of increase (except in London where everyone still seems to want to live!) and for the ardent shopper there are bargains to be had everywhere. It seems strange that prices on the high street do not seem to have increased in over ten years. Mobile phones, DVD players even furniture seems to be cheaper than they used to be. Whist much of this is down to cheaper manufacturing and the rest could probably be explained by competition within the market place. Does this mean that quality suffered too? Now that we live in a world when if a television is not working it is thrown away and replaced. There was a time when you would take it to some odd looking man that your father would know who could fix it for you. (I remember our local television fix-it man, with his thick rimmed bifocal spectacles and a poor comb-over; he had cardboard boxes full of resistors and electrical wires on the floor of his front room that smelt of soldering irons!) Is this consumerism at an extreme or has this move to disposability made us a better society? Before you think these are just ramblings there is a point to this. According to latest global figures of contact lens sales the vast majority of contact lenses fitted around the world are daily, fortnightly or monthly disposable hydrogel lenses. Certainly in the UK over 90% of lenses are disposable (with daily disposables being the most popular, having a market share of over 50%). This begs the question – is this a good thing? Maybe more importantly, do our patients benefit? I think it is worth reminding ourselves why we went down the disposability route with contact lenses in the first place, and unlike electrical goods it was not just so we did not have to take them for repair! There are the obvious advantages of overcoming problems of breakage and tearing of lenses and the lens deterioration with age. The lenses are less likely to be contaminated and the disinfection is either easier or not required at all (in the case of daily disposable lenses). Probably the landmark paper in the field was the work more commonly known as the ‘Gothenburg Study’. The paper, entitled ‘Strategies for minimizing the Ocular Effects of Extended Contact Lens Wear’ published in the American Journal of Optometry in 1987 (volume 64, pages 781-789) by Holden, B.A., Swarbrick, H.A., Sweeney, D.F., Ho, A., Efron, N., Vannas, A., Nilsson, K.T. They suggested that contact lens induced ocular effects were minimised by: •More frequently removed contact lenses •More regularly replaced contact lenses •A lens that was more mobile on the eye (to allow better removal of debris) •Better flow of oxygen through the lens All of these issues seem to be solved with disposability, except the oxygen issue which has been solved with the advent of silicone hydrogel materials. Newer issues have arisen and most can be solved in practice by the eye care practitioner. The emphasis now seems to be on making lenses more comfortable. The problems of contact lens related dry eyes symptoms seem to be ever present and maybe this would explain why in the UK we have a pretty constant contact lens wearing population of just over three million but every year we have over a million dropouts! That means we must be attracting a million new wearers every year (well done to the marketing departments!) but we are also losing a million wearers every year. We certainly are not losing them all to the refractive surgery clinics. We know that almost anyone can now wear a contact lens and we know that some lenses will solve problems of sharper vision, some will aid comfort, and some will be useful for patients with dry eyes. So if we still have so many dropouts then we must be doing something wrong! I think the take home message has to be ‘must try harder’! I must end with an apology for two errors in my editorial of issue 1 earlier this year. Firstly there was a typo in the first sentence; I meant to state that it was 40 years not 30 years since the first commercial soft lens was available in the UK. The second error was one that I was unaware of until colleagues Geoff Wilson (Birmingham, UK) and Tim Bowden (London, UK) wrote to me to explain that soft lenses were actually available in the UK before 1971 (please see their ‘Letters to the Editor’ in this issue). I am grateful to both of them for correcting the mistake.

Simultaneous grouping in cochlear implant listeners:can abrupt changes in level be used to segregate components from a complex tone?

A sudden increase in the amplitude of a component often causes its segregation from a complex tone, and shorter rise times enhance this effect. We explored whether this also occurs in implant listeners (n?=?8). Condition 1 used a 3.5-s “complex tone” comprising concurrent stimulation on five electrodes distributed across the array of the Nucleus CI24 implant. For each listener, the baseline stimulus level on each electrode was set at 50% of the dynamic range (DR). Two 1-s increments of 12.5%, 25%, or 50% DR were introduced in succession on adjacent electrodes within the “inner” three of those activated. Both increments had rise and fall times of 30 and 970 ms or vice versa. Listeners reported which increment was higher in pitch. Some listeners performed above chance for all increment sizes, but only for 50% increments did all listeners perform above chance. No significant effect of rise time was found. Condition 2 replaced amplitude increments with decrements. Only three listeners performed above chance even for 50% decrements. One exceptional listener performed well for 50% decrements with fall and rise times of 970 and 30 ms but around chance for fall and rise times of 30 and 970 ms, indicating successful discrimination based on a sudden rise back to baseline stimulation. Overall, the results suggest that implant listeners can use amplitude changes against a constant background to pick out components from a complex, but generally these must be large compared with those required in normal hearing. For increments, performance depended mainly on above-baseline stimulation of the target electrodes, not rise time. With one exception, performance for decrements was typically very poor.

Stabilisation of isocyanate cross linked polybutadiene binder

Isocyanate cross-linked hydroxy terminated polybutadiene is used as a binder for solid rocket propellant. Rocket motors containing this propellant require a storage life of at least 20 years. During storage it has been found that the important rubbery properties of the binder can be lost due to oxidative cross-linking of the polybutadiene chains. This could cause catastrophic failure when the rocket motor is required. At present the bis-hindered phenol Calco 2246 is used as a thermal oxidative stabiliser, but it's performance is only adequate. This has led to the search for a more efficient stabiliser system. To hasten the evaluation of new antioxidant systems the use of dynamic thermal analysis was investigated. Results showed that a tentative relationship existed between predictions by thermal analysis and the long term oven ageing for simple single antioxidant systems. But for more complex systems containing either autosynergistic or mixed antioxidants no relationship was observed suggesting that results for such an "accelerated" technique cannot be used for the purpose of extrapolation for long term performance. This was attributed to the short time and more aggressive condition used (hjgher temperature and oxygen rich atmosphere in thermal analysis) altering the mechanism of action of the antioxidants and not allowing time for co-operative effect of the combined antioxidant system to form. One potential problem for the binder system is the use of an diisocyanate as a cross-linking agent. This reacts with the hydroxyl hydrogen on the polymer as well as other active hydrogens such as those contained in a number of antioxidants, affecting both cross-linking and antioxidant effectiveness. Studies in this work showed that only antioxidants containing amine moieties have a significant affect on binder preparation, with the phenolic antioxidants not reacting. This is due to the greater nucleophilicity of the amines. Investigation of a range of antioxidant systems, including potentially homo, hetero and autosynergistic systems, has highlighted a number of systems which show considerably greater effectiveness than the currently used antioxidant Calco 2246. The only single antioxidant which showed improvement was the partially unhindered phenol y-Tocopherol. Of the mixed systems combinations of the sulphur containing antioxidants e.g. DLTP with higher levels of chain-breaking antioxidants, especially Calco 2246, were the most promising. Also the homosynergistic mix of an aromatic amine and a phenol was seen to be very effective but the results were inconsistent. This inconsistency could be explained by the method of sample preparation used. It was shown that the efficiency of a number of antioxidant.s could be dramatically improved by the use of ultrasound during the mixing stage of preparation. The reason for this increase in performance is unclear but in the case of the homosynergistic amine/phenol mix both more efficient mixing and/or the production of a novel mechanism of action are suggested

Determining the number of nodes for wireless sensor networks

The number of nodes has large impact on the performance, lifetime and cost of wireless sensor network (WSN). It is difficult to determine, because it depends on many factors, such as the network protocols, the collaborative signal processing (CSP) algorithms, etc. A mathematical model is proposed in this paper to calculate the number based on the required working time. It can be used in the general situation by treating these factors as the parameters of energy consumption. © 2004 IEEE.

Work disability and depressive disorders:impact on the European population

OBJECTIVE: Our aim was to study the impact of depressive disorders on work disability to discover the determinants of depression for work disability in the European countries. DESIGN: The sample was composed of 31,126 individuals from 29 countries included in the 2002 World Health Survey of the World Health Organization. National representative samples of countries from all regions of Europe and with different levels of economic development and health coverage were selected. RESULTS: Estimates of people not working because of ill health did not differ among European countries in relation to levels of economic development or health coverage. Significant determinants of people with diagnosis of depression not working because of ill health (reference category) versus working were age (odds ratio = 0.97), female sex (odds ratio = 1.71), education (odds ratio = 1.11), marital status (being unmarried indicating less probability), lowest income level, and comorbidity with angina pectoris (odds ratio = 0.51). Moreover, according to previous studies, we found some determinants (comorbidity with other diseases, young age, and unemployment) impacting on health status. CONCLUSIONS: Depression is a substantial cause of work disability and it is a complex phenomenon that involves many variables. Investigation into this relationship should improve, focusing on the role of determinants.

Overcoming bottlenecks in the membrane protein structural biology pipeline

Membrane proteins account for a third of the eukaryotic proteome, but are greatly under-represented in the Protein Data Bank. Unfortunately, recent technological advances in X-ray crystallography and EM cannot account for the poor solubility and stability of membrane protein samples. A limitation of conventional detergent-based methods is that detergent molecules destabilize membrane proteins, leading to their aggregation. The use of orthologues, mutants and fusion tags has helped improve protein stability, but at the expense of not working with the sequence of interest. Novel detergents such as glucose neopentyl glycol (GNG), maltose neopentyl glycol (MNG) and calixarene-based detergents can improve protein stability without compromising their solubilizing properties. Styrene maleic acid lipid particles (SMALPs) focus on retaining the native lipid bilayer of a membrane protein during purification and biophysical analysis. Overcoming bottlenecks in the membrane protein structural biology pipeline, primarily by maintaining protein stability, will facilitate the elucidation of many more membrane protein structures in the near future.

A Franco-British comparison of patterns of working hours in large-scale grocery retailing, with specific reference to part-time work

In this thesis patterns of working hours in large-scale grocery retailing in Britain and France are compared. The research is carried out using cross-national comparative methodology, and the analysis is based on information derived from secondary sources and empirical research in large-scale grocery retailing involving employers and trade unions at industry level and case studies at outlet level. The thesis begins by comparing national patterns of working hours in Britain and France over the post-war period. Subsequently, a detailed comparison of working hours in large-scale grocery retailing in Britain and France is carried out through the analysis of secondary sources and empirical data. Emphasis is placed on analyzing part-time working hours. They are contrasted and compared at national level and explained in terms of supply and demand factors. The relationships between the structuring of, and satisfaction with, working hours and factors determining women's integration in the workforce in Britain and France are investigated. Part-time hours are then compared and contrasted in large-scale grocery retailing in the context of the analysis of working hours. The relationship between the structuring of working hours and satisfaction with them is examined in both countries through research with women part-timers in case study outlets. The cross-national comparative methodology is used to examine whether dissimilar national contexts in Britain and France have led to different patterns of working hours in large-scale grocery retailing. The principal conclusion is that significant differences are found in the length, organization and flexibility of working hours and that these differences can be attributed to dissimilar socio-economic, political, and cultural contexts in the two countries.

Angel grants employees their wish – for time off in return for high performance:new breed of incentives based on what staff really want from their employer

Purpose – Describes a new breed of HR strategies that encourage employee involvement and commitment as part of high-performance working (HPW). Design/methodology/approach – Focuses on managing employee attitudes and skills through careful attention to leadership, reward and job-design policies. Highlights the differences between people's formal employment contracts and their less formal “psychological contracts”, and emphasizes the importance of the latter. Provides a case study of UK recruitment consultancy Angel Services Group Ltd, which allows staff who meet their daily targets to go home an hour early. Findings – Urges companies to have processes in place to understand the needs of individual employees. This can be done through leadership policies that require all supervisors and managers not only to manage their staff but also to know them as people. Practical implications – Emphasizes that organizations need to see HPW initiatives as part of the normal way of managing people, and not as “flavour of the month”. Originality/value – Outlines a wide range of initiatives that could help organizations to gain their employees' commitment.

What checkers actually check:an eye tracking study of inhibitory control and working memory

Background - Not only is compulsive checking the most common symptom in Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD) with an estimated prevalence of 50–80% in patients, but approximately ~15% of the general population reveal subclinical checking tendencies that impact negatively on their performance in daily activities. Therefore, it is critical to understand how checking affects attention and memory in clinical as well as subclinical checkers. Eye fixations are commonly used as indicators for the distribution of attention but research in OCD has revealed mixed results at best. Methodology/Principal Finding - Here we report atypical eye movement patterns in subclinical checkers during an ecologically valid working memory (WM) manipulation. Our key manipulation was to present an intermediate probe during the delay period of the memory task, explicitly asking for the location of a letter, which, however, had not been part of the encoding set (i.e., misleading participants). Using eye movement measures we now provide evidence that high checkers’ inhibitory impairments for misleading information results in them checking the contents of WM in an atypical manner. Checkers fixate more often and for longer when misleading information is presented than non-checkers. Specifically, checkers spend more time checking stimulus locations as well as locations that had actually been empty during encoding. Conclusions/Significance - We conclude that these atypical eye movement patterns directly reflect internal checking of memory contents and we discuss the implications of our findings for the interpretation of behavioural and neuropsychological data. In addition our results highlight the importance of ecologically valid methodology for revealing the impact of detrimental attention and memory checking on eye movement patterns.

FREADMAN, AnneThe Livres-Souvenirs of Colette Genre and the Telling of Time Oxford: Legenda, August 2012200 pp., £40.00, ISBN: 978-1-906540-93-7

Full text: The title of the book gives us a major clue on the innovative approach developed by Anne Freadman in her analysis of a particular Colette corpus, the one devoted to auto-biographical writing: Les Vrilles de la vigne, Mes apprentissages, La Maison de Claudine, Sido ,L’E ́toile Vesper and Le Fanal bleu. Freadman follows the powerful lure of Rimbaldianvieilles vieilleries and its echoes with Colette’s fondness for collecting objects, people and memories. To this must be added a technical aspect, that of the study of the genre of Colette’s writing. Freadman argues that, by largely avoiding the autobiographical form, the writer achieves a new way of ‘telling time’, collecting anecdotes and detail taken from the quotidian and setting them within an all-encompassing preoccupation with time. This provides the second part of the title.The sonata form directs the sequence of the book, orchestrated into five parts,from ‘exposition’ to ‘first subject’ to‘bridge’ to ‘second subject’ to ‘recapitulation’. This has the advantage of enabling Freadman to move and progress between distinct themes—autobiography first,then alternative forms—with grace,whilst preserving within her own writing what she sees as the essence of Colette’s relationship to time in her ‘Livres-Souvenirs’, the telling of time. This‘telling of time’ is itself therefore cleverly subjected to the time constraints and freedoms of musical composition. Freadman’s ‘Exposition’ takes us through a discussion of the autobiographical genre, analysing the texts against anumber of theorists, from Lejeune to Benjamin and Ricoeur, before launching into ‘Colette and Autobiography’. It argues pertinently that Colette did not write a ‘sustained’ autobiography, even inthe most autobiographical of her writings, Mes apprentissages. Measured against Goodwin’s three sources for autobiography, confession, apologia and memoirs, Colette’s autobiographical writings appear to be at odds with all of them. Freadman then goes on in Part II of her argument, to persuasively uncover a project that rejects self-scrutiny and with no autobiographical strategy. In ‘Collecting Time’, despite claims of continuity, narrative logic and causality areabandoned in favour of a collection offragments, family stories that are built up generation after generation into familylegends. A close and fruitful analysis of Sidoleads us to a study of ‘The Art of Ending’, concentrating on L’E ́toile Vesperandle Fanal Bleu. The closing chapter gives a fascinating reading of La Naissance du jouras an exemplar of the way in which the two subjects developed in Freadman’s volume are cast together:Colette’s own working through the autobiographical genre, and her refusal to write memoirs, in favour of collecting memories, and the strategies she uses for her purpose. In ‘Recapitulation’, her concluding chapter, Freadman adroitlyen capsulates her analysis in a fetching title: ‘Fables of Time’. Indeed, the wholepremise of her book is to move away from autobiographical genre, having acknowledged the links and debt the corpus owes to it, and into a study of the multiple and fruitful ways in which Colette tells time.The rich and varied readings of thematerial, competently informed by theoretical input, together with acute sensitivity to the corpus, mark out this study as incontournable for Colette scholars.