El poder educativo de la televisión : un discurso paralelo a la escuela

[Es] En este trabajo se parte de la hipótesis de que los propios contenidos televisivos son fuente de aprendizaje a través de las narraciones televisivas. En concreto, defendemos la idea de que es posible enseñar y aprender valores a través de dichas narraciones. Se sistematizan algunas de las investigaciones que han abordado la relación entre televisión y valores desde una triple dimensión: los propios contenidos; el medio en sí mismo y el lenguaje. Esta revisión nos permite defender que las condenas reiteradas a la televisión, responsabilizándola de la mayoría de los males que sufre la juventud, no pueden apoyarse en los estudios que la psicología ha realizado en las últimas décadas. Entendemos que el telespectador incorpora la información televisiva desde distintos contextos y que la enculturación no es unidireccional. Existe una interacción entre contextos de desarrollo y mensajes. Concretamente nos interesa analizar los valores implícitos y explícitos que subyacen a los contenidos televisivos. Para ello basándonos en el modelo elaborado por Schwartz y Bilsky hemos creado un cuestionario (Val-TV 01) con el fin de clasificar los valores e interpretar las conductas visualizadas en los textos televisivos y relacionarlos con los propios valores de los adolescentes.

Una imagen vale más que mil palabras: efectos de las advertencias sanitarias visuales en el descenso del consumo de tabaco: un estudio desde la perspectiva del marketing social

[ES] El tabaco está reconocido hoy día como un factor de riesgo muy importante en multitud de enfermedades, representando un grave riesgo para la salud pública. Entre las medidas previstas por la Organización Mundial de la Salud y por la Comisión Europea está la utilización de advertencias sanitarias sobre los efectos del tabaco en las personas. En España actualmente esas advertencias contienen solo texto.

Marine ecosystems of the North Pacific

Key Messages [pdf, 2.5 Mb] Climate Information Gaps Ocean Productivity Information gaps Living Marine Resources Information gaps Climate [pdf, 1.8 Mb] Productivity [pdf, 5.2 Mb] Nutrients Phytoplankton Zooplankton Living Resources [pdf, 10 Mb] Subarctic coastal systems Central oceanic gyres Temperate coastal and oceanic systems Marine mammals The Human Population [pdf, 5 Mb] Contaminants and Habitat Modifications Aquaculture Knowledge Gaps Glossary Ocean and Climate Changes [pdf, 4.1Mb] Highlights Introduction Atmospheric Indices Change in 1998/99 Comparison of Atmospheric Indices Authorship Yellow Sea / East China Sea [pdf, 2.3 Mb] Highlights Background Status and Trends Hydrography Chemistry Plankton Benthos Fish and invertebrates Marine birds and mammals Issues Critical factors causing change Authorship Japan/East Sea [pdf, 3.3 Mb] Highlights Background Status and Trends Hydrography Chemistry Plankton Fish and Invertebrates Marine Birds and Mammals Critical factors causing change Issues Authorship Okhotsk Sea [pdf, 1.7 Mb] Background Status and Trends Climate Hydrography Chemistry Plankton Fish and Invertebrates Marine Birds and Mammals Issues Critical factors causing change Authorship Oyashio / Kuroshio [pdf, 4.5 Mb] Highlights Background Status and Trends Hydrography Plankton Fish and Invertebrates Marine Birds and Mammals Issues Authorship Western Subarctic Gyre [pdf, 4.5 Mb] Highlights Background Status and Trends Hydrography Chemistry Plankton Fish and Invertebrates Marine Birds and Mammals Issues Authorship Bering Sea [pdf, 2.2 Mb] Highlights Background Status and Trends Hydrography Chemistry Plankton Fish and Invertebrates Marine Birds and Mammals Critical Factors Causing Change Issues Authorship Gulf of Alaska [pdf, 2.6 Mb] Highlights Background Status and trends Hydrography Chemistry Plankton Fish and Invertebrates Marine birds and mammals Critical factors causing change Issues Authorship California Current [pdf, 2.7 Mb] Highlights Background Status and Trends Hydrography Chemistry Plankton Fish and Invertebrates Marine Birds and Mammals Critical Factors Causing Change Issues Authorship Gulf of California [pdf, 1.7 Mb] Highlights Background Status and Trends Hydrography Chemistry Plankton Fisheries Marine Birds and Mammals Critical Factors Causing Change Issues Authorship Transition Zone [pdf, 2.5 Mb] Background Status and Trends Hydrography Chemistry Plankton Fish and Invertebrates Marine Birds and Mammals Issues Authorship Tuna [pdf, 1.5 Mb] Highlights Background Pacific bluefin tuna Albacore tuna Status and trends Ecosystem model and climate forcing Authorship Pacific halibut [pdf, 1.1 Mb] Background The Fishery Climate Influences Authorship Pacific salmon [Updated, pdf, 0.4 Mb] Background Status and Trends Washington, Oregon, and California British Columbia Southeast Alaska Central Alaska Western Alaska Russia Japan Authorship References [pdf, 0.5 Mb]

Digital Students are Different posters

Students have a lot to say about their digital environment, if we listen. But behind the headline messages what they want is complex and contradictory. Different learners need different kinds of technology and technical support to succeed. These posters can be used to stimulate discussion between staff and students as a way of developing a shared understanding of the complexity of these issues. The posters have been updated from their originals to reflect the emerging findings from the FE Digital Student study as well as the HE strand.

SUSTAINABILITY OF OPEN ACCESS SERVICES: Phase 3: The Collective Provision of Open Access Resources

The report ‘Sustainability of Open Access Services - Phase 3: The Collective Provision of Open Access Resources’ discusses the economic and institutional issues faced by those sustaining free infrastructure services. It also identifies strategies to coordinate the collective provision of infrastructure services. These considerations are valuable input for the phases 4 and 5 of the project ‘Sustainability of Open Access Services’. This body of work will lead to practical recommendations for funders and project planners to consider when initiating an infrastructure service. The report was written by Raym Crow and funded by SPARC. Several key messages from the report are of interest. Providing infrastructure services as a public good imposes specific requirements on the design of the sustainability model. The challenge is to get enough institutions to reveal their demand for the service and support this. Arguments for an institution to support can be altruism or reciprocity or there being sufficient benefit to the institution for supporting a service. Institutions can also work together on a service through collective action (collecting voluntary contributions) and cross subsidies (funding collected by offering exclusive benefits to contributors).

Networking for Rural Development: a closer look at the evolution of communications in the STREAM Initiative

What began as a general desire to share messages about processes, technologies, lives and opportunities – among farming and fishing communities and those who work with them – has evolved into a network that shares meanings and lessons learnt. Now instead of relying on core funding or catalytic support, the STREAM Initiative is self-funded through the services its network provides to academic, development and other organizations. (Pdf contains 8 pages).

Failure detectors and communication efficiency in the crash and general omisión failure models

122 p.

A block SPP algorithm for multidimensional tridiagonal equations with optimal message vector length

A parallel strategy for solving multidimensional tridiagonal equations is investigated in this paper. We present in detail an improved version of single parallel partition (SPP) algorithm in conjunction with message vectorization, which aggregates several communication messages into one to reduce the communication cost. We show the resulting block SPP can achieve good speedup for a wide range of message vector length (MVL), especially when the number of grid points in the divided direction is large. Instead of only using the largest possible MVL, we adopt numerical tests and modeling analysis to determine an optimal MVL so that significant improvement in speedup can be obtained.

On optimal message vector length for block single parallel partition algorithm in a three-dimensional ADI solver

It has long been recognized that many direct parallel tridiagonal solvers are only efficient for solving a single tridiagonal equation of large sizes, and they become inefficient when naively used in a three-dimensional ADI solver. In order to improve the parallel efficiency of an ADI solver using a direct parallel solver, we implement the single parallel partition (SPP) algorithm in conjunction with message vectorization, which aggregates several communication messages into one to reduce the communication costs. The measured performances show that the longest allowable message vector length (MVL) is not necessarily the best choice. To understand this observation and optimize the performance, we propose an improved model that takes the cache effect into consideration. The optimal MVL for achieving the best performance is shown to depend on number of processors and grid sizes. Similar dependence of the optimal MVL is also found for the popular block pipelined method.

Arduino bidez trafikoa kontrolatzeko sistema baten diseinua eta garapena

In this project, a system to detect and control traffic through Arduino has been designed and developed. The system has been divided in three parts. On the one hand, we have a software simulator which have been designed and developed to manage the traffic from a computer. The simulator is written in the Java Language and it is able to control four different types of crossroads, offering several options to the user for each one of them. On the other hand, with relation to the hardware, an Arduino board to make a scale model of one of the crossroads that controls the application has been used. This Arduino receives and processes the messages sent from the computer, next it shows the traffic light of the scale model in the same way that are seen in the simulator. And finally, to detect the traffic by the system, it has also been designed and developed a traffic sensor using another Arduino. To communicate the simulator in the computer and the Arduino which has been used to control the hardware of the scale model, and share information among them, the serial communication of each one of them has been used. Once completely developed each part of the system, several tests have been made to validate the correctness of both, software and hardware.

Media of communication among fishermen around Kainji Lake basin

The findings are presented of a study conducted in the framework of the Nigerian-German Kainji Lake Fisheries Promotion Project to examine the role and structure of communication in fishing villages around Kainji Lake in Nigeria. The major aim was to be able to utilize the knowledge at a later stage in the project cycle to pass on fisheries extension messages to fishing communities. The study had the following terms of reference: 1) describe the structure and processes of communication of fishermen around Kainji Lake; 2) identify the formal and informal media of communication used by the fishermen to communicate information concerning their job; 3) describe the problems inhibiting usage of the different media identified; 4) ascertain the extent of use of mass media by fishermen around the lake; and, 5) identify acceptable ways by which fisheries information can be repackaged for the use of extension workers. (PDF contains 58 pages)

Concerted action for successful coastal communities in Tanzania: Lessons from the Tanzania Coastal Management Partnership (TCMP) 2006-2009

The Tanzania Coastal Management Partnership (TCMP) works to implement the National Integrated Coastal Environmental Management Strategy (ICEMS) in Tanzania’s coastal landscapes and seascapes, funded in large measure by the U.S. Agency for International Development. The overarching goal of the Sustainable Coastal Communities and Ecosystems in Tanzania (SUCCESS Tanzania) initiative is to conserve coastal and marine biodiversity while improving the well being of coastal residents through implementation of the Tanzania ICEMS and related ICM policies and strategies. It does this by focusing on three key results: -Policies and Laws that Integrate Conservation and Development Applied -Participatory Landscape Scale Conservation Practiced -Conservation Enterprises Generate Increased and Equitable Benefits from Sustainable Use An additional result sought in the program is gender equity and HIV/AIDS preventive behaviors promoted through communicating HIV/AIDS, environment, and equity messages. (PDF contains 3 pages)

On erasure coding for distributed storage and streaming communications

The work presented in this thesis revolves around erasure correction coding, as applied to distributed data storage and real-time streaming communications.

First, we examine the problem of allocating a given storage budget over a set of nodes for maximum reliability. The objective is to find an allocation of the budget that maximizes the probability of successful recovery by a data collector accessing a random subset of the nodes. This optimization problem is challenging in general because of its combinatorial nature, despite its simple formulation. We study several variations of the problem, assuming different allocation models and access models, and determine the optimal allocation and the optimal symmetric allocation (in which all nonempty nodes store the same amount of data) for a variety of cases. Although the optimal allocation can have nonintuitive structure and can be difficult to find in general, our results suggest that, as a simple heuristic, reliable storage can be achieved by spreading the budget maximally over all nodes when the budget is large, and spreading it minimally over a few nodes when it is small. Coding would therefore be beneficial in the former case, while uncoded replication would suffice in the latter case.

Second, we study how distributed storage allocations affect the recovery delay in a mobile setting. Specifically, two recovery delay optimization problems are considered for a network of mobile storage nodes: the maximization of the probability of successful recovery by a given deadline, and the minimization of the expected recovery delay. We show that the first problem is closely related to the earlier allocation problem, and solve the second problem completely for the case of symmetric allocations. It turns out that the optimal allocations for the two problems can be quite different. In a simulation study, we evaluated the performance of a simple data dissemination and storage protocol for mobile delay-tolerant networks, and observed that the choice of allocation can have a significant impact on the recovery delay under a variety of scenarios.

Third, we consider a real-time streaming system where messages created at regular time intervals at a source are encoded for transmission to a receiver over a packet erasure link; the receiver must subsequently decode each message within a given delay from its creation time. For erasure models containing a limited number of erasures per coding window, per sliding window, and containing erasure bursts whose maximum length is sufficiently short or long, we show that a time-invariant intrasession code asymptotically achieves the maximum message size among all codes that allow decoding under all admissible erasure patterns. For the bursty erasure model, we also show that diagonally interleaved codes derived from specific systematic block codes are asymptotically optimal over all codes in certain cases. We also study an i.i.d. erasure model in which each transmitted packet is erased independently with the same probability; the objective is to maximize the decoding probability for a given message size. We derive an upper bound on the decoding probability for any time-invariant code, and show that the gap between this bound and the performance of a family of time-invariant intrasession codes is small when the message size and packet erasure probability are small. In a simulation study, these codes performed well against a family of random time-invariant convolutional codes under a number of scenarios.

Finally, we consider the joint problems of routing and caching for named data networking. We propose a backpressure-based policy that employs virtual interest packets to make routing and caching decisions. In a packet-level simulation, the proposed policy outperformed a basic protocol that combines shortest-path routing with least-recently-used (LRU) cache replacement.

Irakasleen jarrerak eta usteak ingelesaren sarrera goiztiarrarekiko

LABURPENA: Ingelesaren sarrera goiztiarra ohikoa bihurtu da Euskal Autonomia Erkidegoko ikastetxeetan. Jendeak, oro har, bere eraginkortasuna defendatzen du, baina bere hedapen neurrigarriak kontrako jarrerak ere sustatu ditu. Zurrunbiloaren erdian dago haurra, ingurutik helarazten zaizkion mezuen bitartez hizkuntzekiko bere ikuspegia osatuz doalarik. Bere jarreretan eragiten duten aldagai anitzen artean irakasleek zeresan berezia dute. Hori dela eta, zenbait irakaslek ingelesaren sarrera goiztiarrarekiko duten ikuspuntua aztertzea du helburu ikerketak. Emaitzei erreparatuz, nola tutoreek hala ingeleseko irakasleek jarrera baikorra agertu duten arren, ingelesari eskaini beharko litzaiokeen denborak bereizketa argia azalerazi du. Halaber, irakasleen uste eta iritziak, zenbaitetan, ikasleen adinaren garrantzian oinarritutako sineskerietatik haratago doazela plazaratu da.

Awakening a sleeping giant: The riddle of Latino political participation

For some time now, the Latino voice has been gradually gaining strength in American politics, particularly in such states as California, Florida, Illinois, New York, and Texas, where large numbers of Latino immigrants have settled and large numbers of electoral votes are at stake. Yet the issues public officials in these states espouse and the laws they enact often do not coincide with the interests and preferences of Latinos. The fact that Latinos in California and elsewhere have not been able to influence the political agenda in a way that is commensurate with their numbers may reflect their failure to participate fully in the political process by first registering to vote and then consistently turning out on election day to cast their ballots.

To understand Latino voting behavior, I first examine Latino political participation in California during the ten general elections of the 1980s and 1990s, seeking to understand what percentage of the eligible Latino population registers to vote, with what political party they register, how many registered Latinos to go the polls on election day, and what factors might increase their participation in politics. To ensure that my findings are not unique to California, I also consider Latino voter registration and turnout in Texas for the five general elections of the 1990s and compare these results with my California findings.

I offer a new approach to studying Latino political participation in which I rely on county-level aggregate data, rather than on individual survey data, and employ the ecological inference method of generalized bounds. I calculate and compare Latino and white voting-age populations, registration rates, turnout rates, and party affiliation rates for California's fifty-eight counties. Then, in a secondary grouped logit analysis, I consider the factors that influence these Latino and white registration, turnout, and party affiliation rates.

I find that California Latinos register and turn out at substantially lower rates than do whites and that these rates are more volatile than those of whites. I find that Latino registration is motivated predominantly by age and education, with older and more educated Latinos being more likely to register. Motor voter legislation, which was passed to ease and simplify the registration process, has not encouraged Latino registration . I find that turnout among California's Latino voters is influenced primarily by issues, income, educational attainment, and the size of the Spanish-speaking communities in which they reside. Although language skills may be an obstacle to political participation for an individual, the number of Spanish-speaking households in a community does not encourage or discourage registration but may encourage turnout, suggesting that cultural and linguistic assimilation may not be the entire answer.

With regard to party identification, I find that Democrats can expect a steady Latino political identification rate between 50 and 60 percent, while Republicans attract 20 to 30 percent of Latino registrants. I find that education and income are the dominant factors in determining Latino political party identification, which appears to be no more volatile than that of the larger electorate.

Next, when I consider registration and turnout in Texas, I find that Latino registration rates are nearly equal to those of whites but that Texas Latino turnout rates are volatile and substantially lower than those of whites.

Low turnout rates among Latinos and the volatility of these rates may explain why Latinos in California and Texas have had little influence on the political agenda even though their numbers are large and increasing. Simply put, the voices of Latinos are little heard in the halls of government because they do not turn out consistently to cast their votes on election day.

While these findings suggest that there may not be any short-term or quick fixes to Latino participation, they also suggest that Latinos should be encouraged to participate more fully in the political process and that additional education may be one means of achieving this goal. Candidates should speak more directly to the issues that concern Latinos. Political parties should view Latinos as crossover voters rather than as potential converts. In other words, if Latinos were "a sleeping giant," they may now be a still-drowsy leviathan waiting to be wooed by either party's persuasive political messages and relevant issues.