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There is an increasing global focus on gender diversity and equality in the workplace, particularly regarding women in leadership roles. Our study explores this focus in the wine industry in Australia, examining women's representation in CEO, winemaker, viticulturist, and marketing roles. By using results from a previous Australian study, we find that women have significantly increased their presence in all roles but one (marketing role) when comparing 2007–2013 with 2021–2023. Our study also confirms that women are more likely to be in winemaking and viticulturist roles, conditional upon a woman being in the CEO role. However, women in winemaking and viticulturist roles still lag behind women in leadership roles across other industries in Australia. We offer conclusions and directions for future research.
Heightened reactivity in the amygdala measured by functional magnetic resonance imaging during emotional processing is considered a potential biomarker for clinical depression. Still, it is unknown whether this is also true for depressive symptoms in the general population, and – when in remission after recurrent depressive episodes – it is associated with future episodes.
Methods
Using the UK Biobank population study (n = 11,334), we investigated the association of amygdala reactivity during negative facial stimuli, focusing on lifetime depression (trait), depressive symptoms (state), and the modulating effect of antidepressant (AD) treatment thereof. We employed normative modeling (NM) to better incorporate population heterogeneity of the amygdala activity.
Results
In line with a previous study, depressive symptoms (state) over the last 2 weeks were not associated with the amygdala reactivity signal. Rather, our results indicate a significant positive association (p = 0.03, ω2 = 0.001) between amygdala response and the recurrence of depressive episodes (trait). Longitudinal analysis revealed that the group that had experienced a single depressive episode before showed a significantly increased amygdala response after additional episodes (p = 0.03, ω2 = 0.017). ADs were not associated with amygdala response directly, but decreased associations within episode recurrence severity.
Conclusions
The amygdala response to negative stimuli was associated with an individual’s risk of recurrence of depressive episodes, and AD treatment reduced these associations. This study highlights the relevance of amygdala reactivity as a trait, but not a state biomarker for (recurrent) depression. Moreover, it demonstrates the benefit of applying NM in the context of population data.
Should voting rights be tied to citizenship? Over 20 million noncitizens pay taxes, own businesses and homes, send their children to schools, and make countless economic, social, and cultural contributions every day. Yet they cannot vote to select politicians who make policy that affects their daily lives. Today, noncitizens currently vote legally in local elections in 22 cities and towns in Maryland, Vermont, California, and Washington, DC. These practices have their roots in another little-known fact: noncitizens voted in 40 states at some point in time from the Founding until 1926. Noncitizens voted not only in local elections but also in state and federal elections, and they could hold office such as alderman. “Alien suffrage” was seen as a means to facilitate immigrant incorporation and citizenship, which it did in practice. This article examines the politics and practices of immigrant voting in the US, chronicling the rise and fall—and reemergence—of immigrant voting rights. It explores arguments for and against noncitizen voting, reviews evidence about its impact on policy and American political development, and considers its implications for immigration policy and democratic practice. Debate about immigrant voting rights can be viewed as a microcosm of broader debate about immigration, citizenship, and democracy reflected in scholarship and political conflict embroiling the nation, which holds valuable lessons for scholars and policy makers today. I argue, in a country where “no taxation without representation” was a rallying cry for revolution, such a proposition might not be so outlandish upon further scrutiny.
I study the optimal design of monetary incentives in experiments where incentives are a treatment variable. I propose a novel framework called the Budget Minimization problem in which a researcher chooses the level of incentives that allows her to detect a predicted treatment effect while minimizing her expected budget. The Budget Minimization problem builds upon the power analysis and structural modeling. It extends the standard optimal design approach by explicitly incorporating the budget as a part of the objective function. I prove theoretically that the problem has an interior solution under fairly mild conditions. To showcase the practical applications of the Budget Minimization problem, I provide examples of its implementation in several well-known experiments. I also offer a practical guide to assist researchers in utilizing the proposed framework. The Budget Minimization problem contributes to the experimental economists’ toolkit for an optimal design, however, it also challenges some conventional design recommendations.
The use of amphetamine-type stimulants such as khat has been spreading quickly in eastern parts of Africa, the Arabian region and Asia. However, screening for the provision of early intervention has been inadequate, primarily because of the lack of culturally acceptable and valid screening tools.
Aims
To evaluate the the accuracy of the Problematic Khat Use Screening Tool (PKUST-17) in screening for khat use disorder against the DSM-5 criteria for substance use disorder.
Method
A cross-sectional validation study was conducted in Ethiopia from February to December 2018, among a randomly selected sample of 506 individuals. The study subsample comprised 236 participants. We used the DSM-5 criteria for stimulant use disorders as the standard for determining the criterion validity and optimal cut-off score for the PKUST-17, using the receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve. The DSM-5 criteria for substance use disorders were examined by researchers in a subsample of 232 participants. The PKUST-17 uses a five-point Likert scale (0–4), with total scores ranging from 0 to 68. At the optimal cut-off scores, sensitivity and specificity were determined. In addition, we conducted multivariate logistic regression analysis to evaluate potential convergent validity of the tool.
Results
The area under the ROC curve showed good performance of the PKUST-17 (0.78, 95% CI 0.70–0.85, P < 0.001). A cut-off score above 17 demonstrated a sensitivity of 72% and specificity of 73%. The positive predictive value was 77.6% and the negative predictive value was 65.8% in identifying stimulant use disorder, as per the DSM-5 criteria. Among others, problematic khat use was significantly associated with higher World Health Organization Disability Assessment Schedule 2.0 scores (adjusted odds ratio 1.78, 95% CI 1.04–3.03, P < 0.01) and more depressive symptoms (adjusted odds ratio 4.10, 95% CI 2.36–7.12, P < 0.05).
Conclusions
We found that the PKUST-17 is a valid tool for screening for khat use disorder against the DSM-5 criteria for substance use disorder, and identifying high-risk problematic khat users.
We study electoral campaigns over the long run, through the lens of their spending. We build a novel, exhaustive dataset on U.K. general elections from 1857 to 2017. We provide quantitative insights on the history of campaigns, including the shift away from paid staff toward advertising. We then show that the correlation between candidate spending and votes has strongly increased since the 1880s, peaking in the last quarter of the twentieth century. We link this pattern to the introduction of new information technologies—in particular, local radio and the Internet—and to the transformations of campaign strategies.
Motivational dysfunction is a core feature of depression and can have debilitating effects on everyday function. However, it is unclear which cognitive processes underlie impaired motivation and whether impairments persist following remission. Decision-making concerning exerting effort to obtain rewards offers a promising framework for understanding motivation, especially when examined with computational tools.
Methods
Effort-based decision-making was assessed using the Apple Gathering Task, where participants decide whether to exert effort via a grip-force device to obtain varying levels of reward; effort levels were individually calibrated and varied parametrically. We present a comprehensive computational analysis of decision-making, initially validating our model in healthy volunteers (N = 67), before applying it in a case–control study including current (N = 41) and remitted (N = 46) unmedicated depressed individuals and healthy volunteers with (N = 36) and without (N = 57) a family history of depression.
Results
Four fundamental computational mechanisms that drive patterns of effort-based decisions, which replicated across samples, were identified: overall bias to accept effort challenges; reward sensitivity; and linear and quadratic effort sensitivity. Traditional model-agnostic analyses showed that both depressed groups showed lower willingness to exert effort. In contrast with previous findings, computational analysis revealed that this difference was primarily driven by lower effort-acceptance bias, but not altered effort or reward sensitivity.
Conclusions
This work provides insight into the computational mechanisms underlying motivational dysfunction in depression. Lower willingness to exert effort could represent a trait-like factor contributing to symptoms and a fruitful target for treatment and prevention.
This study synthesized 65 (quasi-)experimental studies published between 2010 and 2024 that examined the use of mobile applications to develop language learners’ vocabulary learning. Bayesian meta-analysis was adopted to assess (1) overall effect size; (2) subgroup analyses (i.e. education level, vocabulary knowledge, aspects of vocabulary learning, learning environment, sample size, mobile application type, gender, and cultural background); and (3) publication bias. A large effect size of 1.28 was found for the overall effectiveness of using mobile applications for vocabulary learning when we restricted the studies to long-term treatment duration of 10 weeks or above. Each moderator was analyzed and discussed, and implications for language teaching and research were provided.
In April 1929, the French authorities in Algeria commissioned a “general survey of the native female workforce,” as part of broader reforms in vocational education and handicrafts policy. Drawing on a wide range of administrative and missionary sources, this article traces the origin and implementation of the survey, showing how Algerian women’s work was made visible, classifiable, and governable in the service of colonial economic and ideological goals. It argues that cultural and statistical representations of Algerian women defined the forms and conditions of their integration into state-sponsored handicrafts, specifically through the promotion of home-based labor. It also explores how the data were shaped by the practices, interpretations, and agendas of the men and women who requested, collected, formatted, and transmitted them. Situating the survey within longer standing practices of quantification, this article shows how Algeria functioned as a colonial laboratory for experimenting with new categories aimed at transforming women into human resources in the service of colonial mise en valeur. After outlining the political goals of the survey in the 1920s, this article examines the measurement criteria used, which reveal the difficulty of capturing forms of work that blur the boundaries between home-based labor and wage labor. It then reconstructs the chain of information production, highlighting the political and personal factors underlying it, as well as the intermediaries on whom administrators relied. Finally, it turns to one of these actors, the missionary congregation of the White Sisters, whose private archives offer valuable insight into everyday practices of quantification.
The disciples of St Thomas Aquinas have organized their enquiries in diverse ways throughout the history of Thomism. The surge of reinvigorated interest in Thomas Aquinas following Leo XIII’s Aeterni Patris inspired a wide variety of purported types of Thomism in the twentieth century. What should Thomists of the twenty-first century learn from their inheritance of past centuries of Thomism? How can they take up Leo XIII’s call vetera novis augere et perficere. I aim to address two issues in this essay. First, to identify a more principled demarcation of approaches to Thomistic enquiry, which eschews the commonplace but problematic and merely sociological classifications of the last century’s ‘schools’ of Thomism. I argue that a more principled and agenda-setting criteria distinguishes “defensive-constructive commentary Thomism” and “tradition-constituted-enquiry Thomism”. The first stresses fidelity to the conclusions found in careful readings of Aquinas’s texts. The second emphasizes fidelity to Aquinas’s systematic forms of enquiry directed to the truth. Second, I then probe the resources these two forms of Thomism have for addressing the epistemological crises facing Thomism, focusing on those concerning how to engage the nova of the sciences and rival philosophical traditions.
Hospital-onset C. difficile infection (HO-CDI) remains a common cause of healthcare-associated infection. This study evaluated antibiotic use (AU) and appropriateness in hospital-onset C. difficile cases compared to matched controls in an inpatient setting at a New York City hospital. Elevated or inappropriate AU was not associated with HO-CDI.
To investigate factors influencing the recruitment and retention of adult community nurses.
Background:
The recruitment and retention of community nurses is a growing global challenge, exacerbated by aging populations and increasing demand for primary and home-based care. Across Europe, nurse shortages threaten healthcare sustainability, with high attrition rates linked to workplace pressures, inadequate staffing, and emotional exhaustion. Despite efforts to strengthen retention, many European countries struggle to maintain adequate staffing levels, particularly in community nursing.
Methods:
An exploratory qualitative approach was used with semi-structured interviews. The interview schedule was shaped by the study’s aims, a prior integrative literature review, and the ‘causal model of turnover for nurses’. Questions explored participants’ experiences of recruitment into community nursing and factors influencing retention. The study focused on registered nurses and service managers within adult community nursing organizations across diverse geographical areas.
Findings:
The study identified eight main themes influencing recruitment and retention: the perfect job, finding true self and fulfilment, alignment with organizational values, prior development and transitional experience, job dissatisfaction, shift in traditional practices, lack of compassionate leadership, and family commitments. Key factors included workplace flexibility, professional identity, job security, and organizational culture. However, challenges such as staffing shortages, lack of career progression, and increased administrative tasks were significant barriers to retention.
Conclusion:
This study highlights the multifaceted challenges surrounding community nurse recruitment and retention, emphasizing the need for targeted strategies that go beyond traditional hospital-focused approaches. While salary improvements remain crucial, broader systemic changes including workplace flexibility, compassionate leadership, and career development opportunities are essential to fostering a sustainable workforce. By addressing these factors through co-designed solutions and evidence-based policy adjustments, healthcare organizations can enhance job satisfaction, reduce attrition, and ultimately strengthen the future of community nursing.
This article studies how cultural heritage influences the differences in risk taking in financial markets. We combine data on the asset allocation of second-generation immigrants in Sweden with risk-taking culture in their parents’ countries of origin. We find that descendants of risk loving cultures are more likely to participate in equity markets, and, conditional on participation, allocate a larger share of financial wealth to equities. Moreover, they take on more idiosyncratic risk by favoring directly held stocks over mutual funds and forming more volatile portfolios. These findings are not driven by selective migration or other country of origin characteristics.
In different parts of the world the claim is increasingly being made that continuous confinement of pet cats (Felis catus) is beneficial for both wildlife conservation and cat welfare. The first part of the claim is almost incontrovertible, but the second is misleading. The assertion that confined animals have superior welfare is rooted in thinking pre-dating the 1960s that equates welfare with physical health. By contemporary accounts of animal welfare, confinement of animals presents major welfare risks, and this recognition has been a major driver of refinement in livestock industries, e.g. moves towards free-range systems. Yet, these risks have not been widely acknowledged in debates over pet cat management. We argue that the current pervasive rhetoric from conservationists and some regulators that cat confinement is beneficial for wildlife and cats is, at best, confusing health with welfare. At worst, it is a deliberate attempt to mislead the public through portraying a win-win scenario where, instead, a trade-off must be navigated. Failure to recognise this trade-off undermines conservation goals three-fold. First, it limits the efficacy of behaviour change interventions to increase confinement. Second, it erodes public trust in organisations perceived as knowingly misleading the public. Finally, it reduces the incentive to make the one decision yielding long-term benefits for both cats and ecosystems; ceasing to own cats at all. Policy-makers should be wary of the allure of false win-win narratives when tackling contentious issues that require trade-offs to be made.
Repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation (rTMS) is a well-established intervention for treatment-resistant depression. However, its effects on patient-reported outcomes, such as quality of life (QoL), have not been fully characterized, especially among older adults. This study compares the impact of rTMS on QoL in younger (<60 years) versus older (≥60 years) adults with major depressive disorder.
Methods
We analyzed data from 531 participants with depression (ages 18–89 years) from two randomized clinical trials (THREE-D and FOUR-D). All participants received either unilateral or bilateral rTMS or theta burst stimulation. QoL was assessed using the Quality of Life Enjoyment and Satisfaction Questionnaire – Short Form at baseline, end of treatment, and 12-week follow-up, and compared between younger adults (age < 60 years; n = 360) and older adults (age ≥ 60 years, n = 171). The clinical relevance of the changes was evaluated through effect sizes, using a predefined threshold of 12 points as the minimal clinically important difference, and comparisons with community norms.
Results
After rTMS treatment, both younger and older adults experienced statistically significant improvements in QoL, with medium to large effect sizes. The effect was sustained over 12 weeks of follow-up. At baseline, only 0.3% of younger adults and 2.3% of older adults reported normal QoL, which significantly increased to, respectively, 19.8 and 19.4% by the end of treatment, and 23.7 and 26.8% at the 12-week follow-up.
Conclusions
rTMS yielded acute and sustained clinically meaningful improvements in QoL, with similar effects among younger and older adults with depression. The magnitude of improvement was comparable to, or exceeded, that reported in antidepressant trials.
In what ways, if any, do justice-involved Black women make political demands? How do they understand their role and rights as citizens? Previous work has focused on identifying forms of political behavior, both formal and deviant (i.e., resistance, subversive acts), and the degree to which different groups participate in these behaviors. Few studies have focused on the sensemaking and ideologies likely motivating the behavior of justice-involved Black women both within and outside the formal political realm (e.g., elections). Drawing on the responses of Black women residents of an urban prison reentry facility, this article illustrates how this group engages in what we describe as “political claimsmaking,” a type of deviant discourse in which participants negotiate the power dynamics informing their social reality to make political demands. Further, we argue that while this political claimsmaking acts as a form of resistance and assertion of citizenship, it is simultaneously a form of inequitable political labor. Understanding Black women’s political claims, and the labor involved in making them, has serious implications for imagining more liberatory futures in which the benefits associated with citizenship are more freely accessed.
Studies have found that voters in democratic countries are far more reluctant to use military force against democracies than against nondemocracies. This pattern may help explain why democracies almost never wage war against other democracies. In an important contribution, Rathbun, Parker, and Pomeroy (2025) propose that the apparent democratic peace in public opinion is an artifact of failing to account for race. Rather than democracy itself influencing support for war, they argue, the term “democracy” cues assumptions about the adversary’s racial composition, and those racialized assumptions are the true drivers of support for war. We reevaluate RPP’s evidence, concluding that their data do not support their predictions. In fact, their novel experiments provide powerful evidence that democracy affects support for war, independent of race. Our findings contribute to major debates about both regime type and race in international relations, as well as the design and interpretation of survey experiments.