Seed retention, and ultimately seed shatter, are extremely important for the efficacy of harvest weed seed control (HWSC) and are likely influenced by various agroecological and environmental factors. Field studies investigated seed-shattering phenology of 22 weed species across three soybean [Glycine max (L.) Merr.]-producing regions in the United States. We further evaluated the potential drivers of seed shatter in terms of weather conditions, growing degree days, and plant biomass. Based on the results, weather conditions had no consistent impact on weed seed shatter. However, there was a positive correlation between individual weed plant biomass and delayed weed seed–shattering rates during harvest. This work demonstrates that HWSC can potentially reduce weed seedbank inputs of plants that have escaped early-season management practices and retained seed through harvest. However, smaller individuals of plants within the same population that shatter seed before harvest pose a risk of escaping early-season management and HWSC.

Potential effectiveness of harvest weed seed control (HWSC) systems depends upon seed shatter of the target weed species at crop maturity, enabling its collection and processing at crop harvest. However, seed retention likely is influenced by agroecological and environmental factors. In 2016 and 2017, we assessed seed-shatter phenology in 13 economically important broadleaf weed species in soybean [Glycine max (L.) Merr.] from crop physiological maturity to 4 wk after physiological maturity at multiple sites spread across 14 states in the southern, northern, and mid-Atlantic United States. Greater proportions of seeds were retained by weeds in southern latitudes and shatter rate increased at northern latitudes. Amaranthus spp. seed shatter was low (0% to 2%), whereas shatter varied widely in common ragweed (Ambrosia artemisiifolia L.) (2% to 90%) over the weeks following soybean physiological maturity. Overall, the broadleaf species studied shattered less than 10% of their seeds by soybean harvest. Our results suggest that some of the broadleaf species with greater seed retention rates in the weeks following soybean physiological maturity may be good candidates for HWSC.

Seed shatter is an important weediness trait on which the efficacy of harvest weed seed control (HWSC) depends. The level of seed shatter in a species is likely influenced by agroecological and environmental factors. In 2016 and 2017, we assessed seed shatter of eight economically important grass weed species in soybean [Glycine max (L.) Merr.] from crop physiological maturity to 4 wk after maturity at multiple sites spread across 11 states in the southern, northern, and mid-Atlantic United States. From soybean maturity to 4 wk after maturity, cumulative percent seed shatter was lowest in the southern U.S. regions and increased moving north through the states. At soybean maturity, the percent of seed shatter ranged from 1% to 70%. That range had shifted to 5% to 100% (mean: 42%) by 25 d after soybean maturity. There were considerable differences in seed-shatter onset and rate of progression between sites and years in some species that could impact their susceptibility to HWSC. Our results suggest that many summer annual grass species are likely not ideal candidates for HWSC, although HWSC could substantially reduce their seed output during certain years.

This paper utilizes original survey data to examine whether individuals believe they share views on public policy with members of their own racial or ethnic group and whether they place an importance on living in legislative districts with people from their own racial or ethnic group. We find strong evidence that Latino and African-American respondents have a sense of shared policy preferences within their own group. Our results also indicate white Republicans are very likely to view themselves as having shared policy preferences within their group. Respondents who have a strong sense of shared policy preferences with their racial group are also the most likely to think it is important to live in legislative districts with others from their own racial or ethnic group. This paper affords a deeper understanding of the extent to which voters express commonality with their racial and ethnic minority group on matters related to public policy.

This paper summarises developments in understanding sea level change during the Quaternary in Scotland since the publication of the Quaternary of Scotland Geological Conservation Review volume in 1993. We present a review of progress in methodology, particularly in the study of sediments in isolation basins and estuaries as well as in techniques in the field and laboratory, which have together disclosed greater detail in the record of relative sea level (RSL) change than was available in 1993. However, progress in determining the record of RSL change varies in different areas. Studies of sediments and stratigraphy offshore on the continental shelf have increased greatly, but the record of RSL change there remains patchy. Studies onshore have resulted in improvements in the knowledge of rock shorelines, including the processes by which they are formed, but much remains to be understood. Studies of Late Devensian and Holocene RSLs around present coasts have improved knowledge of both the extent and age range of the evidence. The record of RSL change on the W and NW coasts has disclosed a much longer dated RSL record than was available before 1993, possibly with evidence of Meltwater Pulse 1A, while studies in estuaries on the E and SW coasts have disclosed widespread and consistent fluctuations in Holocene RSLs. Evidence for the meltwater pulse associated with the Early Holocene discharge of Lakes Agassiz–Ojibway in N America has been found on both E and W coasts. The effects of the impact of storminess, in particular in cliff-top storm deposits, have been widely identified. Further information on the Holocene Storegga Slide tsunami has enabled a better understanding of the event, but evidence for other tsunami events on Scottish coasts remains uncertain. Methodological developments have led to new reconstructions of RSL change for the last 2000 years, utilising state-of-the-art GIA models and alongside coastal biostratigraphy to determine trends to compare with modern tide gauge and documentary evidence. Developments in GIA modelling have provided valuable information on patterns of land uplift during and following deglaciation. The studies undertaken raise a number of research questions which will require addressing in future work.

Traditional research on preferences for redistributive social policy suggest increasingly complex models of public opinion formation that envision individuals balancing normative concerns against sophisticated calculations of economic self-interest. This research largely ignores the large body of evidence demonstrating significant differences in levels of political awareness across the population that strongly influence the quality, structure, and determinants of political preferences. Analyzing public opinion data for 14 European countries reveals that large sections of the population do not appear to hold or express social policy preferences that are internally consistent or well-grounded in either their self-interests or ideological predispositions. At low levels of political awareness, little discernible connection exists between seemingly related preferences for redistribution, levels of social spending, left–right positioning, tolerance for inequality, or overall support for the welfare state. Moreover, income, a theoretically central causal variable, has no effect on attitudes toward redistribution when political awareness is low. These results pose a significant challenge to existing models of social policy preferences.

A strong correlation exists between inequality and religion, such that societies marked by high inequality are more religious than those with more egalitarian income distributions. What explains this correlation? Insecurity theory argues that high inequality generates intense insecurities, leading the poor to seek shelter in religion for both psychological and material comfort. This article develops an alternative perspective that reverses the chain of causality. It argues that religious institutions and movements frequently resist both the centralization of state power and socialist efforts to organize the working class. As a result, powerful religious movements constrain state-led efforts to provide social protection, increasing income inequality. Analysis of the historical record and contemporary data from 19 Western democracies reveals strong evidence that past periods of church-state conflict shaped the size and structure of welfare state institutions and, by extension, contemporary patterns of inequality.

Galls of Diplolepis variabilis (Bassett) (Hymenoptera: Cynipidae) on their host plant Rosa woodsii Lindley (Rosaceae) support a diverse community of parasitoid and inquiline wasps that exploit the gall inducer and the gall itself. Here, we studied quantitative variation in local structure of the gall community in the Okanagan Valley of southern British Columbia, Canada, from the United States border north, to test the hypothesis that dispersal limitation would generate a distance decay in gall community similarity. We also explored gall community richness in relation to latitude, as the northern range limit of the gall inducer occurs within our study area. We found that gall communities exhibited strikingly similar composition across the study region, with most of the major inquilines and parasitoids present across the gall's range. However, the increased richness of rare parasitoid taxa near the northern range limits of D. variabilis generated a marginally significant positive relationship between gall community richness and latitude. Overall, our study suggests that dispersal constraints do not influence the composition of the Diplolepis Geoffroy gall community at regional scales, and that gall communities offer useful models for studying the association between community structure and range limits.

Measures of brain and hippocampal volume in 40 healthy young (aged 18–30 years) and 36 healthy elderly (aged 60–83 years) subjects were compared with composite cognitive function scores in three conceptual domains: memory ability, processing speed, and general fluid intelligence. Through a series of general linear models testing the relationship between these brain measures and cognitive performance scores, a significant positive relationship between hippocampal volume and fluid intelligence ability was found in elderly subjects but not in young. No relationship between the other cognitive domains and brain or hippocampal volume was found. The findings suggest a role of hippocampal atrophy in the decline in fluid intelligence in the elderly. (JINS, 2011, 17, 000–000)

This article examines the debate between the power resources and ‘new politics’ scholars concerning the politics of welfare state retrenchment in advanced industrial democracies. Both approaches make competing claims concerning the relevance of partisan differences in the current age of welfare reform. This article tests the new politics hypothesis that partisanship has had a declining impact on welfare politics over time through an analysis of the growth in the public share of health care spending in 18 countries from 1960 to 2000. Consistent with the new politics approach, the results reveal that the partisan character of government no longer plays a significant role in determining changes in public responsibility for health care during the new politics period. This suggests that the current period is characterised by general agreement across party lines on the broad parameters of the health care system, reducing the intense partisan conflicts of the past to debates over reform at the margins of the health care system.

The aim of the present investigation was to determine whether differences in the strength of original information influence adult age differences in susceptibility to misinformation. One-half of the younger and older adults watched a slide sequence once (one-trial learning) that depicted a theft, whereas the remaining participants viewed the slide sequence repeatedly to ensure that all critical details were encoded (criterion learning). Three weeks later and immediately prior to final testing, participants were asked questions that contained misleading information. As expected, the degree of initial learning influenced age differences in misinformation reporting. That is, when event memory was poorer for older than younger adults (in the criterion learning condition), older adults were more susceptible to misinformation than younger adults. However, when memory of the event was poor (in the one-trial learning condition), the younger adults reported more misled details than the older adults, possibly because the younger adults had better memory for the misleading information. Therefore, strength of initial memory influences the extent and direction of adult suggestibility and helps explain the discrepancy found across studies in this area.

Integration of rye (Secale cereale L.) cover crops into the corn (Zea mays L.) soybean [(Glycine max (L.) Merr.] rotation of the upper Midwest USA can provide many agronomic and agroecological benefits. Integration is made difficult by short growing seasons, but may be facilitated by management of key agroecological interactions such as those between rye and soil microbiota. Rye growth was measured and colonization by arbuscular-mycorrhizal fungi (AMF) was determined in greenhouse experiments using soils from seven different management systems from a long-term cropping-systems experiment in southwest Minnesota. Microbial effects on rye growth were not evident before vernalization, but at final harvest (4 weeks after vernalization) soil microbial populations reduced rye shoot and root growth, relative to a pasteurized control inoculum. At final harvest, shoot biomass in 2-year rotations was 17% greater than 4-year rotations, indicating that microbial populations selected for by 4-year rotations may be more deleterious or pathogenic than those selected for by 2-year rotations. Growth of three rye cultivars was examined in all inocula; cultivars differed in their mean response to soil microbiota and their ability to host AMF. These findings suggest that management factors affect interactions between rye and soil microbiota resulting in altered rye growth.