Faking or Convincing: Why Do Some Advertising Campaigns Win Creativity Awards?

Since the Sarbanes-Oxley Act was passed in 2002, it has become commonplace in the advertising industry to use creativity-award-show prizes instead of gross income figures to attract new customers. Therefore, achieving a top creativity ranking and winning creativity awards have become high priorities in the advertising industry. Agencies and marketers have always wondered what elements in the advertising creation process would lead to the winning of creativity awards. Although this debate has been dominated by pure speculation about the success of different routines, approaches and strategies in winning creativity awards, for the first time our study delivers an empirical insight into the key drivers of creativity award success. We investigate what strategies and which elements of an advertising campaign are truly likely to lead to winning the maximum number of creativity awards. Using a sample of 108 campaigns, we identify factors that influence campaign success at international advertising award shows. We identify innovativeness and the integration of multiple channels as the key drivers of creativity award success. In contrast to industry beliefs, meaningful or personally connecting approaches do not seem to generate a significant benefit in terms of winning creativity awards. Finally, our data suggest that the use of so-called “fake campaigns” to win more creativity awards does not prove to be effective.

Planung und Risikobewertung projektspezifischer Produktionsnetzwerke

Bei Einzel‐ und Kleinserienfertigung müssen sowohl langfristige Kooperationspartner als auch auftrags-spezifische, internationale Partner und Lieferanten in die Produktion komplexer Investitionsgüter einbezogen werden. Zunehmend sind kleine und mittlere Unternehmen (KMU) herausgefordert nicht nur technische Komponenten zu liefern, sondern die komplette Projektplanung zu realisieren. Im Forschungsprojekt „PIP“ soll ein Verfahren entwickelt werden, das gerade KMU des Maschinen- und Anlagenbaus bei der aufwandsmi-nimierten Partner- und Lieferantenauswahl sowie der Einschätzung möglicher Projektrisiken unterstützt. Der vorliegende Artikel beschreibt Rahmenbedingungen beim Aufbau projektspezifischer Produktionsnetzwerke sowie Lösungsansätze zu deren verbesserter Planung und Risikobewertung.

High plant species richness indicates management-related disturbances rather than the conservation status of forests

There is a wealth of smaller-scale studies on the effects of forest management on plant diversity. However, studies comparing plant species diversity in forests with different management types and intensity, extending over different regions and forest stages, and including detailed information on site conditions are missing. We studied vascular plants on 1500 20 m × 20 m forest plots in three regions of Germany (Schwäbische Alb, Hainich-Dün, Schorfheide-Chorin). In all regions, our study plots comprised different management types (unmanaged, selection cutting, deciduous and coniferous age-class forests, which resulted from clear cutting or shelterwood logging), various stand ages, site conditions, and levels of management-related disturbances. We analyzed how overall richness and richness of different plant functional groups (trees, shrubs, herbs, herbaceous species typically growing in forests and herbaceous light-demanding species) responded to the different management types. On average, plant species richness was 13% higher in age-class than in unmanaged forests, and did not differ between deciduous age-class and selection forests. In age-class forests of the Schwäbische Alb and Hainich-Dün, coniferous stands had higher species richness than deciduous stands. Among age-class forests, older stands with large quantities of standing biomass were slightly poorer in shrub and light-demanding herb species than younger stands. Among deciduous forests, the richness of herbaceous forest species was generally lower in unmanaged than in managed forests, and it was even 20% lower in unmanaged than in selection forests in Hainich-Dün. Overall, these findings show that disturbances by management generally increase plant species richness. This suggests that total plant species richness is not suited as an indicator for the conservation status of forests, but rather indicates disturbances.

Impaired gesture performance in schizophrenia: particular vulnerability of meaningless pantomimes

Schizophrenia patients frequently present with subtle motor impairments, including higher order motor function such as hand gesture performance. Using cut off scores from a standardized gesture test, we previously reported gesture deficits in 40% of schizophrenia patients irrespective of the gesture content. However, these findings were based on normative data from an older control group. Hence, we now aimed at determining cut-off scores in an age and gender matched control group. Furthermore, we wanted to explore whether gesture categories are differentially affected in Schizophrenia. Gesture performance data of 30 schizophrenia patients and data from 30 matched controls were compared. Categories included meaningless, intransitive (communicative) and transitive (object related) hand gestures, which were either imitated or pantomimed, i.e. produced on verbal command. Cut-off scores of the age matched control group were higher than the previous cut-off scores in an older control group. An ANOVA tested effects of group, domain (imitation or pantomime), and semantic category (meaningless, transitive or intransitive), as well as their interaction. According to the new cut-off scores, 67% of the schizophrenia patients demonstrated gestural deficits. Patients performed worse in all gesture categories, however meaningless gestures on verbal command were particularly impaired (p = 0.008). This category correlated with poor frontal lobe function (p < 0.001). In conclusion, gestural deficits in schizophrenia are even more frequent than previously reported. Gesture categories that pose higher demands on planning and selection such as pantomime of meaningless gestures are predominantly affected and associated with the well-known frontal lobe dysfunction.

A simple asthma prediction tool for preschool children with wheeze or cough

BACKGROUND Many preschool children have wheeze or cough, but only some have asthma later. Existing prediction tools are difficult to apply in clinical practice or exhibit methodological weaknesses. OBJECTIVE We sought to develop a simple and robust tool for predicting asthma at school age in preschool children with wheeze or cough. METHODS From a population-based cohort in Leicestershire, United Kingdom, we included 1- to 3-year-old subjects seeing a doctor for wheeze or cough and assessed the prevalence of asthma 5 years later. We considered only noninvasive predictors that are easy to assess in primary care: demographic and perinatal data, eczema, upper and lower respiratory tract symptoms, and family history of atopy. We developed a model using logistic regression, avoided overfitting with the least absolute shrinkage and selection operator penalty, and then simplified it to a practical tool. We performed internal validation and assessed its predictive performance using the scaled Brier score and the area under the receiver operating characteristic curve. RESULTS Of 1226 symptomatic children with follow-up information, 345 (28%) had asthma 5 years later. The tool consists of 10 predictors yielding a total score between 0 and 15: sex, age, wheeze without colds, wheeze frequency, activity disturbance, shortness of breath, exercise-related and aeroallergen-related wheeze/cough, eczema, and parental history of asthma/bronchitis. The scaled Brier scores for the internally validated model and tool were 0.20 and 0.16, and the areas under the receiver operating characteristic curves were 0.76 and 0.74, respectively. CONCLUSION This tool represents a simple, low-cost, and noninvasive method to predict the risk of later asthma in symptomatic preschool children, which is ready to be tested in other populations.

“Fitness Fingerprints” Mediate Physiological Culling of Unwanted Neurons in Drosophila

BACKGROUND: The flower gene has been previously linked to the elimination of slow dividing epithelial cells during development in a process known as "cell competition." During cell competition, different isoforms of the Flower protein are displayed at the cell membrane and reveal the reduced fitness of slow proliferating cells, which are therefore recognized, eliminated, and replaced by their normally dividing neighbors. This mechanism acts as a "cell quality" control in proliferating tissues. RESULTS: Here, we use the Drosophila eye as a model to study how unwanted neurons are culled during retina development and find that flower is required and sufficient for the recognition and elimination of supernumerary postmitotic neurons, contained within incomplete ommatidia units. This constitutes the first description of the "Flower Code" functioning as a cell selection mechanism in postmitotic cells and is also the first report of a physiological role for this cell quality control machinery. CONCLUSIONS: Our results show that the "Flower Code" is a general system to reveal cell fitness and that it may play similar roles in creating optimal neural networks in higher organisms. The Flower Code seems to be a more general mechanism for cell monitoring and selection than previously recognized.

Genetic testing for TMEM154 mutations associated with lentivirus susceptibility in sheep.

In sheep, small ruminant lentiviruses cause an incurable, progressive, lymphoproliferative disease that affects millions of animals worldwide. Known as ovine progressive pneumonia virus (OPPV) in the U.S., and Visna/Maedi virus (VMV) elsewhere, these viruses reduce an animal's health, productivity, and lifespan. Genetic variation in the ovine transmembrane protein 154 gene (TMEM154) has been previously associated with OPPV infection in U.S. sheep. Sheep with the ancestral TMEM154 haplotype encoding glutamate (E) at position 35, and either form of an N70I variant, were highly-susceptible compared to sheep homozygous for the K35 missense mutation. Our current overall aim was to characterize TMEM154 in sheep from around the world to develop an efficient genetic test for reduced susceptibility. The average frequency of TMEM154 E35 among 74 breeds was 0.51 and indicated that highly-susceptible alleles were present in most breeds around the world. Analysis of whole genome sequences from an international panel of 75 sheep revealed more than 1,300 previously unreported polymorphisms in a 62 kb region containing TMEM154 and confirmed that the most susceptible haplotypes were distributed worldwide. Novel missense mutations were discovered in the signal peptide (A13V) and the extracellular domains (E31Q, I74F, and I102T) of TMEM154. A matrix-assisted laser desorption/ionization-time-of flight mass spectrometry (MALDI-TOF MS) assay was developed to detect these and six previously reported missense and two deletion mutations in TMEM154. In blinded trials, the call rate for the eight most common coding polymorphisms was 99.4% for 499 sheep tested and 96.0% of the animals were assigned paired TMEM154 haplotypes (i.e., diplotypes). The widespread distribution of highly-susceptible TMEM154 alleles suggests that genetic testing and selection may improve the health and productivity of infected flocks.

BAYESIAN PHASE I DOSE FINDING IN CANCER TRIALS

This dissertation explores phase I dose-finding designs in cancer trials from three perspectives: the alternative Bayesian dose-escalation rules, a design based on a time-to-dose-limiting toxicity (DLT) model, and a design based on a discrete-time multi-state (DTMS) model. We list alternative Bayesian dose-escalation rules and perform a simulation study for the intra-rule and inter-rule comparisons based on two statistical models to identify the most appropriate rule under certain scenarios. We provide evidence that all the Bayesian rules outperform the traditional ``3+3'' design in the allocation of patients and selection of the maximum tolerated dose. The design based on a time-to-DLT model uses patients' DLT information over multiple treatment cycles in estimating the probability of DLT at the end of treatment cycle 1. Dose-escalation decisions are made whenever a cycle-1 DLT occurs, or two months after the previous check point. Compared to the design based on a logistic regression model, the new design shows more safety benefits for trials in which more late-onset toxicities are expected. As a trade-off, the new design requires more patients on average. The design based on a discrete-time multi-state (DTMS) model has three important attributes: (1) Toxicities are categorized over a distribution of severity levels, (2) Early toxicity may inform dose escalation, and (3) No suspension is required between accrual cohorts. The proposed model accounts for the difference in the importance of the toxicity severity levels and for transitions between toxicity levels. We compare the operating characteristics of the proposed design with those from a similar design based on a fully-evaluated model that directly models the maximum observed toxicity level within the patients' entire assessment window. We describe settings in which, under comparable power, the proposed design shortens the trial. The proposed design offers more benefit compared to the alternative design as patient accrual becomes slower.

Does the educational success of children growing up in stepfamilies differ from children growing up in single parent households?

Within the framework of research into educational inequality, this paper focuses on the educational success of children who experience parental separation prior to the transition from primary into secondary education. Related to this, the first education passage following primary school is observed. The question arises as to whether children growing up in single parent households after parental separation and whether children in this category who in addition experienced the formation of a stepfamily differ from one another and from children growing up in “nuclear families” in regard to their scholastic performance and transition success. For that reason, not only scholastic performance (grades) but also the type of school attended following primary school are of particular interest. Furthermore, differences regarding parental educational decision-making are examined (vgl. Stocké 2007). The analyses are based on data from the longitudinal study "BIKS 8-14" (educational processes, competence development and selection decisions in preschool- and school age) that has been undertaken at the Otto Friedrich University in Bamberg.

Mapping epileptic activity: sources or networks for the clinicians?

Epileptic seizures of focal origin are classically considered to arise from a focal epileptogenic zone and then spread to other brain regions. This is a key concept for semiological electro-clinical correlations, localization of relevant structural lesions, and selection of patients for epilepsy surgery. Recent development in neuro-imaging and electro-physiology and combinations, thereof, have been validated as contributory tools for focus localization. In parallel, these techniques have revealed that widespread networks of brain regions, rather than a single epileptogenic region, are implicated in focal epileptic activity. Sophisticated multimodal imaging and analysis strategies of brain connectivity patterns have been developed to characterize the spatio-temporal relationships within these networks by combining the strength of both techniques to optimize spatial and temporal resolution with whole-brain coverage and directional connectivity. In this paper, we review the potential clinical contribution of these functional mapping techniques as well as invasive electrophysiology in human beings and animal models for characterizing network connectivity.

Identification of Trypanosoma brucei components involved in trypanolysis by normal human serum

Normal human serum (NHS) confers human resistance to infection by the parasite Trypanosoma brucei owing to the trypanolytic activity of apolipoprotein L1 (APOL1), present in two serum complexes termed Trypanolytic Factors (TLF-1 and -2). In order to identify parasite components involved in the intracellular trafficking and activity of TLFs, an inducible RNA interference (RNAi) genomic DNA library constructed in bloodstream form T. brucei was subjected to RNAi induction and selection for resistant parasites under NHS conditions favouring either TLF-1 or TLF-2 uptake. While TLF-1 conditions readily selected the haptoglobin-haemoglobin (HP-HB) surface receptor TbHpHbR as expected, given its known ability to bind TLF-1, under TLF-2 conditions no specific receptor for TLF-2 was identified. Instead, the screen allowed the identification of five distinct factors expected to be involved in the assembly of the vacuolar proton pump V-ATPase and consecutive endosomal acidification. These data confirm that lowering the pH during endocytosis is required for APOL1 toxic activity.

A Vertical Asymmetry in Saccades

Visual exploration of natural scenes imposes demands that differ between the upper and the lower visual hemifield. Yet little is known about how ocular motor performance is affected by the location of visual stimuli or the direction of a behavioural response. We compared saccadic latencies between upper and lower hemifield in a variety of conditions, including short-latency prosaccades, long-latency prosaccades, antisaccades, memory-guided sac- cades and saccades with increased attentional and selection demand. All saccade types, except memory guided saccades, had shorter latencies when saccades were directed to- wards the upper field as compared to downward saccades (p<0.05). This upper field reaction time advantage probably arises in ocular motor rather than visual processing. It may originate in structures involved in motor preparation rather than execution.

A proposed framework to operationalize ESS for the mitigation of soil threats

Despite various research activities in the last decades across the world, many challenges remain to integrate the concept of ecosystem services (ESS) in decision-making, and a coherent approach to assess and value ESS is still lacking. There are a lot of different – often context-specific – ESS frameworks with their own definitions and understanding of terms. Based on a thorough review, the EU FP7 project RECARE (www.recare-project.eu) suggests an adapted framework for ecosystem services related to soils that can be used for practical application in preventing and remediating degradation of soils in Europe. This lays the foundation for the development and selection of appropriate methods to measure, evaluate, communicate and negotiate the services we obtain from soils with stakeholders in order to improve land management. Similar to many ESS frameworks, the RECARE framework distinguishes between an ecosystem and human well-being part. As the RECARE project is focused on soil threats, this is the starting point on the ecosystem part of the framework. Soil threats affect natural capital, such as soil, water, vegetation, air and animals, and are in turn influenced by those. Within the natural capital, the RECARE framework focuses especially on soil and its properties, classified in inherent and manageable properties. The natural capital then enables and underpins soil processes, while at the same time being affected by those. Soil processes, finally, are the ecosystem’s capacity to provide services, thus they support the provision of soil functions and ESS. ESS may be utilized to produce benefits for individuals and human society. Those benefits are explicitly or implicitly valued by individuals and human society. The values placed on those benefits influence policy and decision-making and thus lead to a societal response. Individual (e.g. farmers’) and societal decision making and policy determine land management and other (human) driving forces, which in turn affect soil threats and natural capital. In order to improve ESS with Sustainable Land Management (SLM) – i.e. measures aimed to prevent or remediate soil threats, the services identified in the framework need to be “manageable” (modifiable) for the stakeholders. To this end, effects of soil threats and prevention / remediation measures are captured by key soil properties as well as through bio-physical (e.g. reduced soil loss), socio-economic (e.g. reduced workload) and socio-cultural (e.g. aesthetics) impact indicators. In order to use such indicators in RECARE, it should be possible to associate the changes in soil processes to impacts of prevention / remediation measures (SLM). This requires the indicators to be sensitive enough to small changes, but still sufficiently robust to provide evidence of the change and attribute it to SLM.

Evaluation of promising technologies for soil salinity amelioration in Timpaki (Crete): A participatory approach

Soil salinity management can be complex, expensive, and time demanding, especially in arid and semi-arid regions. Besides taking no action, possible management strategies include amelioration and adaptation measures. Here we apply the World Overview of Conservation Approaches and Technologies (WOCAT) framework for the systematic analysis and evaluation and selection of soil salinisation amelioration technologies in close collaboration with stakeholders. The participatory approach is applied in the RECARE (Preventing and Remediating degradation of soils in Europe through Land Care) project case study of Timpaki, a semiarid region in south-central Crete (Greece) where the main land use is horticulture in greenhouses irrigated by groundwater. Excessive groundwater abstractions have resulted in a drop of the groundwater level in the coastal part of the aquifer, thus leading to seawater intrusion and in turn to soil salinisation. The documented technologies are evaluated for their impacts on ecosystem services, cost, and input requirements using a participatory approach and field evaluations. Results show that technologies which promote maintaining existing crop types while enhancing productivity and decreasing soil salinity are preferred by the stakeholders. The evaluation concludes that rainwater harvesting is the optimal solution for direct soil salinity mitigation, as it addresses a wider range of ecosystem and human well-being benefits. Nevertheless, this merit is offset by poor financial motivation making agronomic measures more attractive to users.

Jack-of-all-trades effects drive biodiversity–ecosystem multifunctionality relationships in European forests

There is considerable evidence that biodiversity promotes multiple ecosystem functions (multifunctionality), thus ensuring the delivery of ecosystem services important for human well-being. However, the mechanisms underlying this relationship are poorly understood, especially in natural ecosystems. We develop a novel approach to partition biodiversity effects on multifunctionality into three mechanisms and apply this to European forest data. We show that throughout Europe, tree diversity is positively related with multifunctionality when moderate levels of functioning are required, but negatively when very high function levels are desired. For two well-known mechanisms, ‘complementarity’ and ‘selection’, we detect only minor effects on multifunctionality. Instead a third, so far overlooked mechanism, the ‘jack-of-all-trades’ effect, caused by the averaging of individual species effects on function, drives observed patterns. Simulations demonstrate that jack-of-all-trades effects occur whenever species effects on different functions are not perfectly correlated, meaning they may contribute to diversity–multifunctionality relationships in many of the world’s ecosystems.