Reinventing Housing Care: Environmental Negotiations Made in Congregate Settings During COVID-19

The COVID-19 pandemic prompted an urgent reconsideration of space and place within congregate housing. Research has only underscored the need for health-promoting physical alterations to residential environments (Peters & Halleran, 2020), but also generated lasting questions about the relationships between congregate environments and their residents, visitors, and workforce —among them, what ways can environments be negotiated to reduce risk (Dosa et al., 2020)? How can environments enact care for formal caregivers (Chen & Chavalier, 2021)? Who might be challenged by this care which may question the dangers associated with proximity (Lynn, 2020)? This symposium focuses on the ways stakeholders within congregate housing observed, related to, and negotiated changes to space and place during the pandemic. Paper 1 presents an organizational case study investigating provider perspectives of how housing and healthcare responses to COVID have shaped palliative care with unhoused patients during the pandemic. Paper 2 highlights the collaborative work of a multi-sector coalition working to address timely needs of residents in low-income senior buildings. Paper 3 reflects on the formation of a cross-national senior housing network and the interdisciplinary exchange of best practices and policy recommendations that emerged. The collective findings of these papers challenge previous notions of care in congregate environments, illuminate how provider networks respond to crises and share emergent knowledge, and consider how institutional decisions about the pandemic have re-placed and re-spaced provider and patient experiences. This symposium offers observations and strategies that may assist in envisioning successful congregate care during COVID-19 and beyond.

A Revised Framework for the Investigation of Expectation Update Versus Maintenance in the Context of Expectation Violations: The ViolEx 2.0 Model

Expectations are probabilistic beliefs about the future that shape and influence our perception, affect, cognition, and behavior in many contexts. This makes expectations a highly relevant concept across basic and applied psychological disciplines. When expectations are confirmed or violated, individuals can respond by either updating or maintaining their prior expectations in light of the new evidence. Moreover, proactive and reactive behavior can change the probability with which individuals encounter expectation confirmations or violations. The investigation of predictors and mechanisms underlying expectation update and maintenance has been approached from many research perspectives. However, in many instances there has been little exchange between different research fields. To further advance research on expectations and expectation violations, collaborative efforts across different disciplines in psychology, cognitive (neuro)science, and other life sciences are warranted. For fostering and facilitating such efforts, we introduce the ViolEx 2.0 model, a revised framework for interdisciplinary research on cognitive and behavioral mechanisms of expectation update and maintenance in the context of expectation violations. To support different goals and stages in interdisciplinary exchange, the ViolEx 2.0 model features three model levels with varying degrees of specificity in order to address questions about the research synopsis, central concepts, or functional processes and relationships, respectively. The framework can be applied to different research fields and has high potential for guiding collaborative research efforts in expectation research.

Advances in the Resection and Reconstruction of Midfacial Tumors Through Computer Assisted Surgery

Curatively intended oncologic surgery is based on a residual-free tumor excision. Since decades, the surgeon’s goal of R0-resection has led to radical resections in the anatomical region of the midface because of the three-dimensionally complex anatomy where aesthetically and functionally crucial structures are in close relation. In some cases, this implied aggressive overtreatment with loss of the eye globe. In contrast, undertreatment followed by repeated re-resections can also not be an option. Therefore, the evaluation of the true three-dimensional tumor extent and the intraoperative availability of this information seem critical for a precise, yet substance-sparing tumor removal. Computer assisted surgery (CAS) can provide the framework in this context. The present study evaluated the beneficial use of CAS in the treatment of midfacial tumors with special regard to tumor resection and reconstruction. Therefore, 60 patients diagnosed with a malignancy of the upper jaw has been treated, 31 with the use of CAS and 29 conventionally. Comparison of the two groups showed a higher rate of residual-free resections in cases of CAS application. Furthermore, we demonstrate the use of navigated specimen taking called tumor mapping. This procedure enables the transparent, yet precise documentation of three-dimensional tumor borders which paves the way to a more feasible interdisciplinary exchange leading e.g. to a much more focused radiation therapy. Moreover, we evaluated the possibilities of primary midface reconstructions seizing CAS, especially in cases of infiltrated orbital floors. These cases needed reduction of intra-orbital volume due to the tissue loss after resection which could be precisely achieved by CAS. These benefits of CAS in midface reconstruction found expression in positive changes in quality of life. The present work was able to demonstrate that the area of oncological surgery of the midface is a prime example of interface optimization based on the sensible use of computer assistance. The fact that the system makes the patient transparent for the surgeon and the procedure controllable facilitates a more precise and safer treatment oriented to a better outcome.

Forest History—New Perspectives for an Old Discipline

The scientific field of forest history studies the development of woodlands and their interrelationship with past human societies. During the last decades, the subject has experienced a constant decrease of importance, reflected in the loss of representation in most universities. After 200 years of existence, an insufficient theoretical basis and the prevalence of bibliographical and institutional studies on post-medieval periods have isolated the field and hindered interdisciplinary exchange. Here we present possible new perspectives, proposing wider methodological, chronological, thematic, and geographical areas of focus. This paper summarizes the development of the field over time and recommends content enhancement, providing a specific example of application from Roman France. Furthermore, we introduce a topical definition of forest history. Following the lead of other fields of the humanities and environmental sciences focussing on the past, forest history has to adapt to using other available archives in addition to historical written sources. In particular, historical and archeological timber as well as pollen are essential sources for the study of past forests. Research into forest history can substantially add to our understanding of relevant issues like societal responses to climate change and resource scarcity in the past and contribute to future scenarios of sustainability.

Second-person Perspective in Interdisciplinary Research: A Cognitive Approach for Understanding and Improving the Dynamics of Collaborative Research Teams

In this paper, we argue that to reverse the excess of specialization and to create room for interdisciplinary cross-fertilization, it seems necessary to move the existing epistemic plurality towards a collaborative process of social cognition. In order to achieve this, we propose to extend the psychological notion of joint attention towards what we call joint intellectual attention. This special kind of joint attention involves a shared awareness of sharing the cognitive process of knowledge. We claim that if an interdisciplinary research team aspires to work collaboratively, it is essential for the researchers to jointly focus their attention towards a common object and establish a second-person relatedness among them. We consider some of the intellectual dispositions or virtues fostered by joint intellectual attention that facilitate interdisciplinary exchange, and explore some of the practical consequences of this cognitive approach to interdisciplinarity for education and research.

Facial Feature Removal for Anonymization of Neurological Image Data

Interdisciplinary exchange of medical datasets between clinicians and engineers is essential for clinical research. Due to the Data Protection Act, which preserves the rights of patients, full anonymization is necessary before any exchange can take place. Due to the continuous improvement of image quality of tomographic datasets, anonymization of patient-specific information is not sufficient. In this work, we present a prototype that allows to reliably obscure the facial features of patient data, thus enabling anonymization of neurological datasets in image space.

Using Virtual Learning Environment Data for the Development of Institutional Educational Policies

This paper describes the application of Data Science and Educational Data Mining techniques to data from 4529 students, seeking to identify behavior patterns and generate early predictive models at the Universidad de la República del Uruguay. The paper describes the use of data from different sources (a Virtual Learning Environment, survey, and academic system) to generate predictive models and discover the most impactful variables linked to student success. The combination of different data sources demonstrated a high predictive power, achieving prediction rates with outstanding discrimination at the fourth week of a course. The analysis showed that students with more interactions inside the Virtual Learning Environment tended to have more success in their disciplines. The results also revealed some relevant attributes that influenced the students’ success, such as the number of subjects the student was enrolled in, the students’ mother’s education, and the students’ neighborhood. From the results emerged some institutional policies, such as the allocation of computational resources for the Virtual Learning Environment infrastructure and its widespread use, the development of tools for following the trajectory of students, and the detection of students at-risk of failure. The construction of an interdisciplinary exchange bridge between sociology, education, and data science is also a significant contribution to the academic community that may help in constructing university educational policies.

A revised framework for the investigation of expectation update versus maintenance in the context of expectation violations: the ViolEx 2.0 model

Expectations are probabilistic beliefs about the future that shape and influence our perception, affect, cognition, and behaviour in many contexts. This makes expectations a highly relevant concept across basic and applied psychological disciplines. When expectations are confirmed or violated, individuals can respond by either updating or maintaining their prior expectations in light of the new evidence. Moreover, proactive and reactive behaviour can change the probability with which individuals encounter expectation confirmations or violations. The investigation of predictors and mechanisms underlying expectation update and maintenance has been approached from many research perspectives, however, in many instances with little exchange between different research fields. To further advance research on expectations and expectation violations, collaborative efforts across different disciplines in psychology, cognitive (neuro)science, and other life sciences are warranted. For fostering and facilitating such efforts, we introduce the ViolEx 2.0 model, a revised framework for interdisciplinary research on cognitive and behavioural mechanisms of expectation update and maintenance in the context of expectation violations. To support different goals and stages in interdisciplinary exchange, the ViolEx 2.0 model features three model levels with varying degrees of specificity in order to address questions about the research synopsis, central concepts, or functional processes and relationships, respectively. The framework can be applied to different research fields and has high potential for guiding collaborative research efforts in expectation research.

Interdisciplinary Projects as an Expert-Network

We report an analysis of how an interdisciplinary project bringing together biologists, physicists and engineers worked in practice. The authorship team are the Principle Investigator who led the project, and a social scientist who studied the project as it was conducted by interviewing participants and observing practice. We argue it is accurate and productive to think of the interdisciplinary team as an Expert-Network, which means it was a managed set of relationships between disciplinary groups punctuated by specific junctions at which interdisciplinary exchange of materials, knowledge, and in limited cases, practices, occurred. We stress the role of trust in knowledge exchange, and document how hard sharing knowledge – and especially tacit knowledge - between disciplines can be. Key is the flexible management of the network, as the membership and required skill set change. Our analysis is embedded within, and contributes to, the Sociology of Experience and Expertise (SEE) framework. We close by suggesting advice for others seeking to manage a similar interdisciplinary Expert-Network.