Smartphone Time Machine: Tech-Supported Improvements in Time Perspective and Wellbeing Measures

Individuals with a balanced time perspective, which includes good thoughts about the past, awareness of present constraints and adaptive planning for a positive future, are more likely to report optimal wellbeing. However, people who have had traumas such as adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) are likely to have less balanced time perspectives and lower overall wellbeing when compared to those with fewer or no ACEs. Time perspective can be improved via time-travel narratives that support people in feeling connected to a wise and loving future version of themselves, an approach that has until now only been provided in counseling contexts. Our team used an iterative inclusive design process to shape a scalable time-travel narrative tool – a responsive and progressive web application called Time Machine. Among other functionalities, Time Machine allowed people to record and listen to messages as if they were from and to their past and future selves. Using pre-planned as well as post-hoc analyses, we analyzed quantitative and qualitative data from 96 paid design partners (participants) who were taken through a 26-day pilot study of the technology. Among other effects, the results revealed: (1) high engagement throughout the design process, (2) improvements in self-reported time perspective and overall wellbeing scores that were greater for those using Time Machine during an optional-use period, (3) twice as much improvement in overall wellbeing scores for design partners with high ACEs (16%) versus low ACEs (8%), and (4) feelings of unconditional love apparently mediating the relationship between scores on time perspective and overall wellbeing measures. We discuss the limitations of these results as well as implications for the future role of spiritually informed scalable time-travel narrative technologies in healthcare and wellness.

In-Company Smart Charging: Development of a Simulation Model to Facilitate a Smart EV Charging System

Current electric vehicle (EV) charging systems have limited smart functionality, and most research focuses on load-balancing the national or regional grid. In this article, we focus on supporting the early design of a smart charging system that can effectively and efficiently charge a company’s EV fleet, maximizing the use of self-generated Photo-Voltaic energy. The support takes place in the form of the Vehicle Charging Simulation (VeCS) model. System performance is determined by operational costs, CO2 emissions and employee satisfaction. Two impactful smart charging functions concern adaptive charging speeds and charging point management. Simulation algorithms for these functions are developed. The VeCS model is developed to simulate implementation of a smart charging system incorporating both charging infrastructure and local Photo-Voltaics input, using a company’s travel and energy data, prior to having the EVs in place. The model takes into account travel behaviour, energy input and energy consumption on a daily basis. The model shows the number of charged vehicles, whether incomplete charges occur, and energy flow during the day. The model also facilitates simulation of an entire year to determine overall cost and emission benefits. It also estimates charging costs and CO2 emissions that can be compared to the non-EV situation. With the VeCS model, the impact of various system design and implementation choices can be explored before EVs are used. Two system designs are proposed for the case company; a short-term version with current technology and a future version with various smart functionalities. Overall, the model can contribute to substantiated advice for a company regarding implementation of charging infrastructure.

Asynchronous Delivery of a 400 Level, Partially Peer-Graded, Oral Presentation and Discussion Course in Systems Neuroscience for 60 Students during the COVID-19 Pandemic

A 400-level undergraduate oral presentation and discussion course in Systems Neuroscience was delivered asynchronously online during the COVID-19 pandemic. Enrolled students banked their narrated oral presentations in video format online then engaged in peer evaluation in virtual classrooms through the course website. Student delivered their oral presentation and responded to peer questions at their leisure and convenience, without the stress and anxiety associated with a “live” performance delivery in front of their peers. A remote and asynchronously delivered course facilitated much more peer contact than “live” versions of the course, which included a total of 62 uploaded presentations, 301 video responses uploaded to 1985 questions posed by peers, a total of 1159 feedback questionnaires submitted, 1066 rankings submitted of viewed oral presentations, and 1091 scores submitted evaluating the quality of questions posed by reviewers of oral presentations. A major drawback in the remote, asynchronous deliver was the enormity of peer engagement through the course website portal, which was mostly blind to the instructor because of the inability to effectively cross-index data linked between the student entries in the LEARN course website and the uploaded videos stored within BONGO Video Assignment tool. Nonetheless, a consistent engagement of students, and the positive feedback from enrolled students, indicate that a future version of this oral/written discussion course will be delivered, in part, remotely and asynchronously, even without a mandated delivery of the course by a remote and asynchronous method due to the COVID-19 pandemic restrictions in 2020–2021.

Some New Developments in Two-Way-Stop-Controlled Intersections Procedures and Recommendations for a Future Version of the Highway Capacity Manual

The estimation of capacities and traffic performance at two-way-stop-controlled (TWSC) intersections has been the subject of investigations conducted by many researchers. The results of these investigations are incorporated in highway capacity manuals like the U.S. Highway Capacity Manual (HCM) or the German Handbuch für die Bemessung von Strassen (HBS). Although the underlying methodologies are similar, there are two major differences between the current HBS 2015 and HCM6: (a) the procedure for the impedance factor for movements of rank 4 and (b) the procedure for estimating the capacity of shared short lanes for both minor and major movements. In HBS 2015, new developments are accounted for and the accuracy of capacity and traffic quality estimations significantly improved. In HCM6, these two procedures have not been updated. Therefore, the replacement of the two procedures in HCM6 is recommended. In both HCM6 and HBS 2015, the procedures for calculating delays at shared lanes or shared short lanes are inaccurate and they also should be updated. In most cases, the delays are significantly underestimated. Recently, the authors have developed a new methodology dealing with this problem which can be easily incorporated into future versions of HBS and HCM. In this paper, the theoretical backgrounds of the three new methods are presented and major results are summarized. Compared with HCM6, the advantages of the new developments are highlighted. As a recommendation, three corresponding procedures for estimation of capacity and delay are given for potential use in a future version of HCM.

Effect of the Conductor Positioning on Low-Power Current Transformers: Inputs for the Next IEC 61869-10

Low-power instrument transformers (LPITs) are spreading among the distribution network thanks to their features (e.g., compactness, lightness, enhanced bandwidth, etc.). It is then a fundamental to guide users and manufacturers to a correct usage and manufacturing of the LPITs. Technical committees, which are in charge of writing dedicated standards, often tackle such a task. Focusing on the current type of LPITs, the low-power current transformers (LPCTs), the associated standard is the IEC 61869-10, which is going to be improved in 2021. To this purpose, the work aims at providing new inputs for the future version of such a standard. In particular, the focus is pointed towards the effects of the conductor positioning on the window-type LPCT accuracy. Literature and gained experience in the field are the two pillars that have been used to refine the outcomes of the work, which are provided in terms of suggestions for each technical aspect, as discussed in the standard, related to LPCTs.

A “Social Bitcoin” Could Sustain a Democratic Digital World

A multidimensional financial system could provide benefits for individuals, companies, and states. Instead of top-down control, which is destined to eventually fail in a hyperconnected world, a bottom-up creation of value can unleash creative potential and drive innovations. Multiple currency dimensions can represent different externalities and thus enable the design of incentives and feedback mechanisms that foster the ability of complex dynamical systems to self-organize and lead to a more resilient society and sustainable economy. Modern information and communication technologies play a crucial role in this process, as Web 2.0 and online social networks promote cooperation and collaboration on unprecedented scales. Within this contribution, we discuss how one dimension of a multidimensional currency system could represent socio-digital capital (Social Bitcoins) that can be generated in a bottom-up way by individuals who perform search and navigation tasks in a future version of the digital world. The incentive to mine Social Bitcoins could sustain digital diversity, which mitigates the risk of totalitarian control by powerful monopolies of information and can create new business opportunities needed in times where a large fraction of current jobs is estimated to disappear due to computerization.

Service innovation roadmaps and responsible entities learning

Service-Dominant Logic (S-D Logic) and service science provide a way for innovators and learners to look at the world differently and thereby improve quality-of-life for people over time. The continued development of service science as an emerging transdiscipline will depend on developing better measurements and tools for understanding the past and future identities, reputations, values, goals, and strategies of entities interacting to achieve outcomes. For example, Service Innovation Roadmaps (SIRs) can be thought of as an attempt to make explicit the “learning investment strategy” of responsible entities (people, businesses, regional governments) to change and become “better future version of themselves” in terms of value co-creating service interactions. In short, SIRs can help with the challenge of upskilling people in an age of accelerating technology and policy changes. All service systems, as responsible entities learning, invest in three types of activities, herein termed Run- Transform-Innovate activities. This short paper provides context for a research direction to develop further the notions of SIRs and embrace complexity economics as a tool for advancing service science.

Damages to a Child and the Proposed Fair Calculations Act: A Case Study

The Fair Calculations Act seeks to prohibit courts from using race, ethnicity, gender, religion, or actual or perceived sexual orientation in awarding damages to plaintiffs in civil actions. The legislation died in the 114th Congress but a similar bill was introduced in the House of Representatives and the Senate on September 19, 2019 and is in the early stage of the legislative process. California's Senate Bill No. 41 (2019) which is similar to the Fair Calculations Act became law on January 1, 2020. This case study examines economic damages of a male and female child suffering the same traumatic injury from an automobile collision shortly after birth assuming that some future version of the Fair Calculation Act becomes law.

Interpolation uncertainty of atmospheric temperature profiles

This paper is motivated by the fact that, although temperature readings made by Vaisala RS41 radiosondes at GRUAN sites (https://www.gruan.org/, last access: 30 November 2020) are given at 1 s resolution, for various reasons, missing data are spread along the atmospheric profile. Such a problem is quite common with radiosonde data and other profile data. Hence, (linear) interpolation is often used to fill the gaps in published data products. From this perspective, the present paper considers interpolation uncertainty, using a statistical approach to understand the consequences of substituting missing data with interpolated data. In particular, a general framework for the computation of interpolation uncertainty based on a Gaussian process (GP) set-up is developed. Using the GP characteristics, a simple formula for computing the linear interpolation standard error is given. Moreover, the GP interpolation is proposed as it provides an alternative interpolation method with its standard error. For the Vaisala RS41, the two approaches are shown to provide similar interpolation performances using an extensive cross-validation approach based on the block-bootstrap technique. Statistical results about interpolation uncertainty at various GRUAN sites and for various missing gap lengths are provided. Since both approaches result in an underestimation of the interpolation uncertainty, a bootstrap-based correction formula is proposed. Using the root mean square error, it is found that, for short gaps, with an average length of 5 s, the average uncertainty is less than 0.10 K. For larger gaps, it increases up to 0.35 K for an average gap length of 30 s and up to 0.58 K for a gap of 60 s. It is concluded that this approach could be implemented in a future version of the GRUAN data processing.

Students’ Learning Support and Perceptions in an Online Mathematics Course in a Business Faculty

Online courses are growing in higher education, resulting from an increased access to information and communication technologies. While such courses allow time and/or space flexibility for both students and instructors, they also promote active learning and require more autonomy from the students. In this paper, we present the main design features of a new prerequisite mathematics online course in a business faculty. While most of the course was designed in an asynchronous mode, it also includes blended synchronous support sessions that students can attend each week. As a Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (SoTL) project, we related the design features of the course to students’ learning support and perceptions by analyzing the content of the learning management system as well as students’ narrative comments in course teaching evaluations over five semesters. The main themes reported concerned the appreciated course design and structure, the enhanced instructor’s presence through commented slideshows and support sessions, the instructor’s accessibility and care, a challenging but relevant course, and collaborative practice with a software application. In particular, the instructor’s presence and follow-up throughout the semester was highlighted by the students as a means to support their learning. Furthermore, most students’ comments reported positive perceptions about the online course and specific design features. Several comments also allowed to identify potential areas for change in a future version on the course, as part of the SoTL research that focuses on teaching and learning improvement.