Improved Transferability of Data‐Driven Damage Models Through Sample Selection Bias Correction

Damage models for natural hazards are used for decision making on reducing and transferring risk. The damage estimates from these models depend on many variables and their complex sometimes nonlinear relationships with the damage. In recent years, data‐driven modeling techniques have been used to capture those relationships. The available data to build such models are often limited. Therefore, in practice it is usually necessary to transfer models to a different context. In this article, we show that this implies the samples used to build the model are often not fully representative for the situation where they need to be applied on, which leads to a “sample selection bias.” In this article, we enhance data‐driven damage models by applying methods, not previously applied to damage modeling, to correct for this bias before the machine learning (ML) models are trained. We demonstrate this with case studies on flooding in Europe, and typhoon wind damage in the Philippines. Two sample selection bias correction methods from the ML literature are applied and one of these methods is also adjusted to our problem. These three methods are combined with stochastic generation of synthetic damage data. We demonstrate that for both case studies, the sample selection bias correction techniques reduce model errors, especially for the mean bias error this reduction can be larger than 30%. The novel combination with stochastic data generation seems to enhance these techniques. This shows that sample selection bias correction methods are beneficial for damage model transfer.     

陈训慈与抗战时期浙江省图书文化事业

抗战时期，中国图书文化事业备受日寇摧残，众多文化典籍被日寇劫掠而去或毁于战火。在此特殊时期，陈训慈征求各类文献，举办图书文献展览会，保护文澜阁《四库全书》与天一阁藏书，撰文与创刊宣传浙江图书文化事业，创建图书馆协会推进全省图书文化事业，为图书文化事业做出了难以磨灭的贡献。     

Farmers’ Risk‐Based Decision Making Under Pervasive Uncertainty: Cognitive Thresholds and Hazy Hedging

Researchers in judgment and decision making have long debunked the idea that we are economically rational optimizers. However, problematic assumptions of rationality remain common in studies of agricultural economics and climate change adaptation, especially those that involve quantitative models. Recent movement toward more complex agent‐based modeling provides an opportunity to reconsider the empirical basis for farmer decision making. Here, we reconceptualize farmer decision making from the ground up, using an in situ mental models approach to analyze weather and climate risk management. We assess how large‐scale commercial grain farmers in South Africa (n = 90) coordinate decisions about weather, climate variability, and climate change with those around other environmental, agronomic, economic, political, and personal risks that they manage every day. Contrary to common simplifying assumptions, we show that these farmers tend to satisfice rather than optimize as they face intractable and multifaceted uncertainty; they make imperfect use of limited information; they are differently averse to different risks; they make decisions on multiple time horizons; they are cautious in responding to changing conditions; and their diverse risk perceptions contribute to important differences in individual behaviors. We find that they use two important nonoptimizing strategies, which we call cognitive thresholds and hazy hedging, to make practical decisions under pervasive uncertainty. These strategies, evident in farmers' simultaneous use of conservation agriculture and livestock to manage weather risks, are the messy in situ performance of naturalistic decision‐making techniques. These results may inform continued research on such behavioral tendencies in narrower lab‐ and modeling‐based studies.     

We are not walking wave functions. A response to “Quantum Mind and Social Science” by Alexander Wendt

Alexander Wendt raises many interesting questions in this book, but to get to the answers he wants, he relies on a misunderstanding of the nature of the quantum states of macroscopic objects.     

Deep Uncertainties in Sea-Level Rise and Storm Surge Projections: Implications for Coastal Flood Risk Management

Sea levels are rising in many areas around the world, posing risks to coastal communities and infrastructures. Strategies for managing these flood risks present decision challenges that require a combination of geophysical, economic, and infrastructure models. Previous studies have broken important new ground on the considerable tensions between the costs of upgrading infrastructure and the damages that could result from extreme flood events. However, many risk-based adaptation strategies remain silent on certain potentially important uncertainties, as well as the tradeoffs between competing objectives. Here, we implement and improve on a classic decision-analytical model (Van Dantzig 1956) to: (i) capture tradeoffs across conflicting stakeholder objectives, (ii) demonstrate the consequences of structural uncertainties in the sea-level rise and storm surge models, and (iii) identify the parametric uncertainties that most strongly influence each objective using global sensitivity analysis. We find that the flood adaptation model produces potentially myopic solutions when formulated using traditional mean-centric decision theory. Moving from a single-objective problem formulation to one with multiobjective tradeoffs dramatically expands the decision space, and highlights the need for compromise solutions to address stakeholder preferences. We find deep structural uncertainties that have large effects on the model outcome, with the storm surge parameters accounting for the greatest impacts. Global sensitivity analysis effectively identifies important parameter interactions that local methods overlook, and that could have critical implications for flood adaptation strategies.     

When implicit prejudice does not predict explicit prejudice: Spanish version of the Concern with Acting Prejudiced scale / Cuando el prejuicio implícito no predice el explícito: versión española de la escala Concern with Acting Prejudiced

The aim of this research was to adapt and validate the Concern with Acting Prejudiced (CAP) scale for a Spanish sample. This measure evaluates concern about appearing prejudiced to others or oneself and the motivation not to deviate from personal egalitarian standards. First, we completed the translation and an item content validity analysis. Then, in Study 1 (N = 198), we conducted an exploratory factor analysis. In Study 2 (N = 383), we conducted a confirmatory analysis of the unifactorial structure of the Spanish version of the scale and examined its validity. In Study 3 (N = 89), we explored the moderating role of participants’ concern with acting prejudiced in the relation between implicit prejudice and explicit prejudice. The results confirmed the unifactorial structure of the scale, its appropriate psychometric properties and its predictive validity. Moreover, we confirmed that the CAP moderated the relation between implicit and explicit prejudice. In participants with a low concern with acting prejudiced, implicit prejudice was positively related with modern prejudice; in participants with a high concern with acting prejudiced, these variables were not related.     

The business of writing: literature as a commodity in Claudia Piñeiro’s Betibú

This article presents considerations about the status of literature as a commodity and writers as professionals in the twenty-first century. These considerations are based on an analysis of Argentine writer Claudia Piñeiro’s Betibú (2011), which follows the story of an Argentine crime novel writer who becomes a ghostwriter after her latest novel receives harsh reviews for being considered commercial rather than literary. I argue that the novel in question points out misconceptions about the influence of the book industry on the aesthetic quality of literary writing, highlighting the need for literary criticism to look into everyday relations between readers, authors, and editors.     

错位与适应：学前教育小学化“为何”与“何为”

为了探究利益相关者视角下学前教育小学化产生的原因及其对策,以重心下移与深度聚焦为思路,对Z市X区4名家长和2名老师进行访谈,借助扎根理论,建构出学前教育小学化"错位"与"适应"的双重生态。"错位"诠释了学前教育小学化的"为何",具体表现为"主体错位"和"职责错位"的复杂交错。"适应"解释了学前教育小学化的"何为",具体表现为适应主体是"家长、幼儿园和辅导班的三管齐下";适应策略包括"坚决抵抗、无奈妥协、精明调适和无知得意";适应类型是"预防型和善后型、强迫型和引导型、突击型和持久型、长远型和短视型"的相互融合。     

The relations between maternal mental state talk and preschoolers’ behavioral adaptation and school readiness: moderation by emotion situation knowledge

This study investigated the extent to which associations between mothers' elaborated talk about mental states and preschoolers’ behavioral adaptation (i.e., social competence and internalizing and externalizing behavior) and school readiness were moderated by emotion situation knowledge. Families (N = 120) were mostly middle‐income and White and 70 of the preschoolers (M = 50.65 months, SD = 6.19) were boys. Results revealed a positive association between elaborated maternal mental state talk and social competence, but only for children average and high in emotion situation knowledge. For children low in emotion situation knowledge, there was a positive association between elaborated maternal mental state talk and internalizing behavior. There also was a negative relation between elaborated maternal mental state talk and school readiness for preschoolers low in emotion situation knowledge. Findings highlight the importance of considering emotion situation knowledge when examining associations between elaborated maternal mental state talk and young children’s social behavioral adaptation and readiness for school.     

基于儿童视角的幼儿绘本选择偏好研究

从儿童视角出发,通过马赛克的方法倾听山西某幼儿园大、中、小班幼儿对绘本选择时的意见,运用NVivo12定性分析软件对原始资料进行编码和分析。研究发现:幼儿对绘本的偏好主要受内部体验、情节、自身兴趣与经验以及角色形象等因素的影响,除此之外绘本的封面和题材在一定程度上影响幼儿对绘本的态度,而艺术风格、造型、图画技法、开本对幼儿绘本选择的影响较低。最后对幼儿绘本选择偏好的总体特点以及“儿童参与”的困境进行了分析讨论,并从绘本的创作者和传递者两个不同的主体提出可能的突破策略:绘本创作者:倾听幼儿的声音,理解幼儿的需求;绘本传递者:重视幼儿的参与,构建发展共同体。