Search results for "Approach"
showing 10 items of 1654 documents
ESA's sentinel missions in support of Earth system science
2012
Abstract The spatial and temporal characteristics of the new Sentinel missions, primarily designed to provide routine multidisciplinary observations for operational services, are also very suitable for addressing some of the challenges associated with advancing Earth System sciences. The Sentinels are ensuring long-term observational commitment and will operate a range of instruments with different spectral bands and spatial resolutions with global coverage and high revisit times. The complexity of Earth System models has been increasing gradually and most simulations of future climate and Earth system evolution are based on coupled models that include aspects of physics, bio/geo-chemistry,…
Fungi and Bacteria in Indoor Cultural Heritage Environments: Microbial-related Risks for Artworks and Human Health
2016
Cultural heritage constitutive materials can provide excellent substrates for microbial colonization, highly influenced by thermo-hygrometric parameters. In cultural heritage-related environments, a detrimental microbial load may be present both on manufacts surface and in the aerosol. In this study, bacterial and fungal colonisation has been investigated in three Sicilian confined environments (archive, cave and hypogea), each with peculiar structures and different thermo-hygrometric parameters. Particular attention has been paid to microorganisms able to induce artifacts biodeterioration and to release biological particles in the aerosol (spores, cellular debrides, toxins and allergens) p…
Composition of families and subjective economic well-being: an application to Italian context
2011
Using Italian data on Income and Living Conditions for the year 2005, the paper explores empirically whether the determinants of subjective economic well-being (SEW) differ (or not) in four representative typologies of households. By means of a Partial Proportional Ordered Logit Model the subjective economic well-being – proxied by the capacity of households to make ends meet – has been explored. Results highlight the variables acting on SEW, common to each typology, are related both to economic status (specifically, the capacity to pay taxes and to afford housing, clothes and holiday expenditures) and to socio-demographic status (specifically, the work-status and the highest level of educa…
Emotions in Economic Decision Making: A Multidisciplinary Approach
2013
AbstractAccording to classical and neoclassical economics, decisions are made based on information and cost-benefit analysis. In reality, the decision making process is much more complex than previously thought, because it also involves psychological factors. Decision making is interdisciplinary, researched by psychologists, sociologists, economists, philosophers, neuroscientists and others. These fields have distinctive and common concepts about decision making. The aim of this paper is to identify what role emotions play in the economic decision making process. The paper focuses on describing and explaining the interconnection of sciences, such as economics, psychology and neuroscience, b…
Dominant and emerging approaches in the study of higher education policy change
2012
The purpose of the article is to analyse recent literature on higher education policy change. Based on the review, three different approaches are distinguished: structural, actor and agency. In the structural approach the dynamic of policy change originates in well-established structures. The actor approach focuses on either individual or institutional actors as the drivers of policy change. The agency approach understands higher education policy change as an interactive process between various actors and domains within transient structures. We will also present two emerging, alternative approaches: actor-network theory, which takes interaction as a starting point and proposes that no organ…
Defamilisation, Dedomestication and Care Policy: Comparing Childcare Service Provisions of Welfare States
2011
PurposeThis paper aims to use perspectives from both mainstream and feminist welfare state research in drafting a conceptual approach for social care research. This approach is then applied empirically to a comparative analysis of childcare provisions of 15 OECD countries.Design/methodology/approachThe concept of dedomestication is developed from a discussion on the notions of decommodification and defamilisation, and it is defined as the degree to which social care policies make it possible for people to participate in society and social life outside their homes and families. In the empirical part of the paper, dedomestication of childcare service provisions of 15 welfare states is measure…
Romanian Households Dealing with Precariousness: A life-course approach
2016
This paper addresses the main pathways through which households avoid slipping into poverty in Romania by employing a life-course approach. Recent researches on social stratification found that in every country we can delineate a particular social layer composed of households living just above the poverty threshold, whose members struggle to reach a more secure prosperity while facing constant threats of downward mobility. Drawing on recent precarious prosperity research, and based on in-depth interviews carried out in 2013 with 25 households situated in between poverty and prosperity from a Romanian city (Cluj-Napoca), we use a life-course approach in order to account for the main routes i…
An eco-social approach to tackling social exclusion in European cities: A new comparative research project in progress
2000
In this article we would like to introduce a three-year Research Project called 'New Local Policies against Social Exclusion in European Cities', financed by the Targeted Socio-Economic R ...
Grassroots Social Innovation for Human Development: An Analysis of Alternative Food Networks in the City of Valencia (Spain)
2017
This paper explores the contribution the capability approach (CA) and grassroots innovation (GI) literature makes to a better understanding of the complexity, richness and specificity of bottom-up processes of social innovation (SI), and their specific contribution to social transformation. Using a purely qualitative methodology, the paper addresses a case study—organic food buying groups in the city of Valencia—and examines them through the lenses of SI, GI and CA. By taking four concurrent dimensions of the SI literature (agents, purposes, drivers and processes) and cross-fertilising them with the bottom-up, people-driven character of GI, and the concepts of agency, capabilities, delibera…
A multiple criteria decision model for analyzing and choosing among different development patterns for the Helsinki cargo harbor
1999
Abstract This paper describes a real application of a multicriteria approach to choosing among different options for developing the Helsinki harbor. In addition to the environmental impact assessment procedure, an analysis of the alternatives using the SMAA-method (Stochastic Multiobjective Acceptability Analysis) is carried out. The method applied here has been developed for situations in which the use of decision-makers’ preference information is not possible. Instead, the problem is described by typical weight vectors leading to each solution, taking into account the evident uncertainty embedded in the criteria values.