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Drawing on ethnographic research with the devout members of Gülen movement displaced in the aftermath of the coup attempt in 2016, this paper studies the existential crisis these formerly "proper Turkish citizens" have been experiencing after being targeted by the Turkish State. This existential crisis, as argued in this paper, is significantly informative in understanding how privilege-based ethical self-making emanates fragility. The paper, thus, both parallels Sunni-Turkish-ness with whiteness and provides a reading of ethical self-making processes the Gülenists developed vis-à-vis the notions of critique and comfort. It first looks closer at the two Islamic revivalist movements, Milli Görüş as the predecessors of Turkey's ruling AKP (Adalet ve Kalkınma Partisi/Justice and Development Party) and the Gülen Movement, their rivalry over claiming the canon and the ways in which they differ in their notions of politics, political Islam, and critique. Although critique and self-critique are integral components of ethical self-formation processes, Gülen movement takes a somewhat inconsistent approach in implementing them to the heteronomous layers of self. Meaning, that while self-critique is an essential part of ethical self-making, critiquing the movement itself, the state, nation, and ancestors (as they were imagined) are not seen as ethical acts. It concludes with an analysis of how this discrepancy results in a sporadic distribution of ethical self-formation, leading to an existential crisis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Since the seminal paper of Nelson and Plosser (J Monet Econ 10(2):139–162, 1982), analyzing the nature of shocks to macroeconomic and financial data has attracted great attention and it continues to be up-to-date, especially, in conjunction with the advances in unit root literature. This paper examines the persistence in macroeconomic and financial variables for Turkey by means of the recent developments in the quantile autoregression models to account for non-normal distributions, structural changes, and asymmetric dynamics. The results show that while the conventional unit root approaches fail to reject the null hypothesis of unit root for most the of 30 macroeconomic and financial time series, the nonlinear quantile unit root test with smooth structural changes supports evidence on a stable long-run equilibrium for 23 variables. It further reveals asymmetric persistence in most of the Turkey's macroeconomic and financial data, implying that the effect of an economic shock in inflationary state is different than that in recessionary state. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study delves into the repercussions of the 2023 earthquake in Turkey, particularity its impact on air pollution. A year post-event, it is evident that scientific literature has paid limited attention to monitoring the situation. However, the release of hazardous substances, such as asbestos, lead, and other toxins, from damaged structures poses a significant threat by contaminating nearby air, soil, and water sources, thereby jeopardizing ecosystems and public well-being. The improper disposal of waste post-earthquake and the presence of mining and oil refinery sites in the region contribute to potential air pollutants. These circumstances create challenging environments conducive to the spread of respiratory diseases, with potential long-term health and social consequences. Unfortunately, existing data gaps hinder a comprehensive understanding of the situation. This paper pioneers the reporting and analysis of data regarding potential sources of air pollution resulting from the earthquake in Turkey. It also pinpoints gaps in knowledge, outlining areas that demand further investigation. To effectively prevent and mitigate air pollution risks and associated health concerns linked to earthquakes, strategic recommendations are proposed. A key suggestion is the establishment of post-disaster air pollution monitoring systems capable of swiftly identifying emerging health issues, facilitating efficient responses, and curtailing potential long-term effects of the disaster. The paper underscores the necessity for continuous health monitoring of the affected population to mitigate possible adverse impacts on human health. These strategies play a pivotal role in reducing the likelihood of air pollution, supporting emergency response and recovery initiatives, and fostering new dedicated scientific studies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the last two decades, urban redevelopment practices in informal settlements in Turkey often neglected inhabitants' spatial practices. The contradictions between conceived and lived space constitutes reactions to these spatial interventions. Against this background, this paper examines the association between place attachment and residents' attitudes toward the redevelopment project in an informally developed neighborhood. Using path and decision tree analysis of survey data, the paper explores the relationship between their attitudes towards and their attachment to the neighborhood. Our findings reveal that individuals' social and physical bonds with their neighborhood shape their attitude toward urban redevelopment. As such, this study confirms the idea that daily interactions between residents reinforce their place attachment in informal settlements where place identity compensates for the (low) quality of life. Still, our findings also demonstrate that residents' identification with the place is a more influential factor, compared to the risk of leaving the neighborhood, on the level of concern against spatial interventions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Covid-19 pandemic negatively affected many sectors including aviation and travel. Travel bans and forced lockdowns prevented transportation activity, especially air travel. Accordingly, huge amounts of emission reductions occurred. On the other hand, travel restrictions are not the only cause of emissions reductions. Changing travel intention in the era of Covid-19 is another important factor that affects aviation emissions. This paper aims to investigate the Landing/Take-Off (LTO) emission changes at Turkish airports. An emission inventory has been implemented for the years 2019 and 2020 to reveal the impacts of Covid-19 on aviation emissions. Domestic, international, and cargo flights have been included in the inventory. According to the results, total emissions of SO2, CO2, CO, NOx, NMVOC, CH4, N2O, and PM2.5 have decreased in 2020 compared to 2019 by 49.8%, 49.7%, 41.0%, 52.6%, 40.0%, 33.8%, 49.8%, and 50.3%, respectively. Total CO2 reductions in the Q2, Q3, and Q4 periods of 2020 compared to that of 2019 are 87%, 50% and 43%, respectively. Another aim of this paper is to find the underlying reasons for emission reductions. For Turkish airports, emission reductions have resulted from travel bans in Q2. After the relaxation of restrictions with the declaration of the "New Normal" in Turkey, flight traffic rebounded to a certain level but was lower than 2019 levels. Therefore, changing travel intention is the main cause of emission reductions in Q3 and Q4 of 2020. The results of this study contribute to both the areas of air pollution and tourism management. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

How do nonstate organizations carry out their programs in political contexts hostile to civil society activity? This paper examines the case of refugee-supporting organizations in Turkey, which hosts over 3.6 million Syrians under a temporary protection regime. While the Turkish state has taken a central role in refugee reception, nonstate organizations have played a sizeable role in refugee support. Analyzing interviews with key personnel across 23 organizations in Istanbul, the paper finds that organizational capacity and organizational identity together explain variations in CSO-state relations. While high-capacity organizations that adopt a variety of "rights-based" and "needs-based" identities will cooperate with state institutions, lower-capacity organizations use comparable signifiers to justify selective engagement or avoidance of state institutions. The paper argues that analyzing how organizations negotiate their identities can help explain variations in CSO-state relations in restrictive contexts without relying on a priori assumptions about CSO alignment with or opposition to the state. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The influence of Covid-19 pandemic crisis on rates of return is analyzed in this paper in the light of possible data manipulation related to reporting systems provided by the administration in the USA, Turkey and Poland. The study used various methods of analyzing the relationship of a discrete, non-discrete and dichotomous data nature between the studied variables. As a result, the strongest reaction of the market was observed in Turkey followed by the USA and Poland. It can be concluded that the reaction of the surveyed markets was influenced by the data manipulations. The added value of the article is related to the use of various methods to study phenomena and detect the impact of data manipulation on the markets. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the susceptibility of post-conflict democratization processes to civilian forms of ethnic violence. Shifting the focus away from institutions and political elites, which dominate analyses on democracy and ethnic violence, the paper analyzes social relations and struggles among civilians during post-conflict democratization. Through an analysis of anti-Kurdish communal violence in twenty-first-century Turkey, the paper shows that social movements led by minorities demanding recognition make ethnicity a politically salient cleavage. This triggers contention over ethnic boundaries, resulting in civilian forms of ethnic violence. A key finding of this paper is that violence is not merely an outcome of increasing polarization and division but also a strategy employed by dominant populations to reinforce former boundaries and reduce uncertainties surrounding the existing ones. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Research on counselors-in-training is necessary to improve the success of the counseling process. The counseling skills used by counselors are critical to managing this process. This paper aims to contribute to the existing body of knowledge in counseling pedagogy by examining the role of counselor characteristics as a mediator in the relationship between counselors-in-training values and counseling skills. In this study, we had 524 counselors-in-training from various universities in Turkey. The results showed that the values of counselors-in-training significantly predict their counselor characteristics. Specifically, the values of the counselors-in-training predict their counseling skills, with the mediating role of the counselor characteristics. Additionally, the counselor characteristics of the counselors-in-training significantly predicted their counseling skills. Various practices and methods can be applied to improve counseling skills. Given that the development of values allows counselors-in-training to acquire important counselor characteristics, value education is essential in the training of counselors. Individuals who acquire essential counselor characteristics can use their counseling skills effectively. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A Soft Computing technique is one of the essential problems solving techniques for the researchers present in the world. Compared to other issues solving techniques, the Soft Computing domain gives outstanding performance, so the researchers are concentrating the Soft Computing domain for solving problems. Soft Computing domain categorizes into many sub-domains, like Neural Networks, Machine Learning, and Genetic Algorithm. Through this paper, we considered to study the impact produced by the Institutions as well as authors in the domain of Soft Computing from the year 1999 to 2019 for PubMed database. From the overall study, we found that China has made more number of publications, author productivity, and influential authors. Some countries, like Russia, Saudi Arabia, and Turkey, with minimum author productivity and minimum publications from the Asian continent in the Soft Computing-related domains. From the research, we determined that china dominates in terms of Institutions wise and Author productivity in the field of Soft Computing domain. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This discussion article presents a critical appraisal of three empirical correlations developed via multiple regression analysis and presented in the Kayabali et al. [Geotech Geol Eng 41:4473–4485, 2023. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10706-023-02527-0] (the Authors') investigation for the determination of the soil consistency limits. Specifically, based solely on British Standard (BS) fall-cone (FC) test data, the Authors purport that the correlations given by Equations 2 and 3 of their paper can be used to predict the ASTM rolling-plate plastic limit (i.e., PLRP), while their Equation 4 can be used to predict the BS FC liquid limit (i.e., LLFC). The Authors demonstrated that these correlations gave good predictions of the measured LLFC and PLRP water contents (i.e., wL(FC) and wP(RP), respectively) for 87 fine-grained soils they sourced from different parts of Central Turkey. Employing newly compiled large and diverse consistency limits databases assembled from the published research literature, this discussion article confirms that the Authors' Equations 2 and 3 generally produce poor wP(RP) predictions for the fine-grained soils comprising these databases, invariably overestimating (often seriously) their measured plastic limit values. Hence, the Discussers recommend that the Authors' Equations 2 and 3 (being generally unreliable beyond the investigated Turkish soils) should not be used in geotechnical engineering practice. While the Authors' single-point LLFC method given by their Equation 4 broadly appears as a good wL(FC) predictor for the newly compiled database soils, it is noted that there already exist well-established and standardised single-point LLFC methods. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study aims to analyze the time-varying effects of global economic policy uncertainty (GEPU) shocks on macroeconomic activity in Turkey over the quarterly period of 1999q1 to 2020q4. To this end, the study uses the GEPU index developed by Davis (Working paper 22740, National Bureau of Economic Research, 2016) and employs the time-varying parameter vector autoregression (TVP-VAR) model. Empirical evidence shows that the GEPU shocks have adverse effects on the macroeconomic activity as they result in declines in share prices, investment, employment, consumption, and GDP growth. It is also evident that these effects vary over time, with the highest impact observed following the crises periods such as the 9/11 attacks, the Iraq invasion, the global financial crisis (GFC), and the Covid-19 pandemic. The time-varying impacts typically reach the maximum in the first and second lag periods, and the most severe impacts of uncertainty are observed on share prices and investment. The study also examines three substantial events (the 9/11 attacks, the GFC, and the Brexit referendum) and finds that the responses of the underlying variables to GEPU shocks vary both in magnitude and signs over the sample period. The responses of the variables are mainly more severe during the periods when geopolitical and economic concerns are high compared to periods of political crises. Overall, the findings from the analyses indicate that the Turkish economy still maintains its fragile structure and suggest that the adverse macroeconomic effects of foreign uncertainty shocks do not remain the same over time. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Two large earthquakes (Mw = 7.7 and Mw = 7.6) that occurred in Turkey on February 6, 2023, affected a very extent region and caused a lot of loss of life and property. This paper presents preliminary results from geophysical measurements (Seismic Refraction Tomography-SRT, Multi-Channel Surface Wave Analysis-MASW and Microtremor-MT) on eight profiles in four provinces (Kahramanmaraş, Hatay, Malatya, Gaziantep) to understand the relationship between subsurface properties and the destruction that occurs immediately after earthquakes. By analyzing the geophysical data, the dynamic-elastic properties of ground and the soil classification according to Vs30 were determined. It is generally understood that the near-surface (< ~ 10–15 m) units in the measurement areas are very loose, and the deeper ones (≥ ~ 15–20 m) have a very porous/fractured structure. Soil classes were defined as ZD (Malatya-1, Hatay-1 and Kahramanmaraş-1) and ZC (Malatya-2, Hatay-2, Gaziantep-1,2 and Kahramanmaraş-2). In addition, by evaluating the information of strong ground motion station closest to the measurement profiles, it is observed that the PGA values versus epicenter distances are higher at stations in the zone parallel to the direction of both faults than those in the perpendicular zones. This leads directivity effect in the propagation of earthquake waves. The results indicate that one of the basic reasons for the damages is that the earthquake-ground-structure relationship has not been fully and accurately reflected in building designs. Therefore, future researches involving more geophysical data and PGA values will provide more information about the structural, physical and geotechnical properties of subsurface and definitive results. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper analyzes the impact of renewable energy consumption, total factor productivity (TFP), income, imports, and exports on consumption-based CO2 emissions in Turkey from 1990 to 2019, utilizing the Autoregressive Distributed Lagged (ARDL) method. The findings indicated that the use of renewable energy, total factor productivity and exports negatively influence CO2 emissions. On the other hand, the positive impact of income and imports on CO2 emissions was found. The negative impact of renewable energy consumption and total factor productivity highlights the importance of implementing environmentally friendly measures in the energy sector (particularly raising the proportion of renewable energy in overall energy consumption) and technological innovation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper is focused on study of the geomagnetic field variation response caused by a series of earthquakes with magnitudes of Mw = 7.5–7.8 in Turkey on February 6, 2023. The initial data include high-precision observations of the geomagnetic field with a one-second sampling rate recorded at magnetic observatories in Russia and neighboring countries from middle to high latitudes. The paper analyzes the morphology of the geomagnetic signal, its amplitude-frequency characteristics, pulses in the rate of change and delays of the geomagnetic field response to earthquakes with magnitudes Mw = 7–8 depending on the distance to the source. The results suggest that the geomagnetic effect is detected best in the rate of change recordings, reaching anomalous amplitudes of 10 nT/s. The signal delay ranges from 221 to 592 s depending on the magnetic field component and the distance to the epicenter, which is in the range from 765 to 2650 km for the selected observatories. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Since its inception, YouTube has been a source of entertainment and education. Everyday millions of videos are uploaded to this platform. Researchers have been using YouTube as a source of information in their research. However, there is a lack of bibliometric reports on research carried out on this platform and the pattern in the published works. This study aims at providing a bibliometric analysis on YouTube as a source of information to fill this gap. Specifically, this paper analyzes 1781 articles collected from the Scopus database spanning fifteen years. The analysis revealed that 2006-2007 were initial stage in YouTube research followed by 2008 -2017 which is the decade of rapid growth in YouTube research. The 2017 -2021 is considered the stage of consolidation and stabilization of this research topic. We also discovered that most relevant papers were published in small number of journals such as New Media and Society, Convergence, Journal of Medical Internet Research, Computers in Human Behaviour and the Physics Teacher, which proves the Bradford's law. USA, Turkey, and UK are the countries with the highest number of publications. We also present network analysis between countries, sources, and authors. Analyzing the keywords resulted in finding the trend in research such as "video sharing" (2010-2018), "web -based learning" (2012-2014), and "COVID -19" (2020 onward). Finally, we used Multiple Correspondence Analysis (MCA) to find the conceptual clusters of research on YouTube. The first cluster is related to user -generated content. The second cluster is about health and medical issues, and the final cluster is on the topic of information quality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Energy poverty is a challenging issue that hampers economic and sustainable development and lowers people's standard of living. While trying to understand energy poverty, it is imperative to focus on the disadvantaged individuals mentioned in the literature, as they are often most vulnerable to the problem. Focusing on them is essential to achieving sustainable development goals, especially in developing countries, particularly regarding poverty, energy poverty, and gender equality. Therefore, the paper aims to examine the impact of economic precarity on working-age females' energy poverty perceptions using 2018–2020 TURKSTAT-SILC pooled cross-sectional data. Our findings from the bivariate probit, multivariate probit and Bayesian bivariate probit models suggested that economic precarity has a disruptive role on females' energy poverty perceptions. Furthermore, inefficient energy use is an important factor in influencing females' perceptions of energy poverty. Females' inability to pay required housing expenses increases their perceived energy poverty. Therefore, social-welfare policies and energy policies should be considered together by the policymakers to resolve females' energy poverty problem to achieve a more sustainable future. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract—This paper analyzes the use of the automated aftershock hazards assessment system (AFCAST) through the example of a series of aftershocks of the Mw 7.8 earthquake in Turkey of February 6, 2023 (the Pazarcik earthquake). The paper presents automated estimates of the aftershock activity area, the magnitude of the strongest aftershock, and the duration of the hazardous period, yielded using data on the main shock and on the first aftershocks. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Even if families in migration contexts have been the subject of an increasing amount of attention in migration research in the recent years, there is a noticeable knowledge deficit with regard to current parenting practices and socialization goals of immigrant families living in Germany. This is particularly striking since child-rearing is of central importance for children's development and their educational pathways. This paper seeks to fill this gap, drawing on the survey "Growing up in Germany: Everyday Life" (AID:A) provided by the German Youth Institute (DJI). Similarities and differences in attitudes towards parenting among immigrant mothers compared to mothers without migration backgrounds were analyzed with regard to parenting practices (emotional warmth, punishment and child's active participation) and socialization goals (performance/self-control and positive social behavior). In a sample of 5870 mothers reporting on a child under the age of nine, mothers in families where both they and the father had Turkey, Russia or Poland as their country of origin were included and compared to autochthonic families. The results revealed significant differences in parenting practices and socialization goals between mothers with and without migration backgrounds. Concerning parenting practices, Turkish and Russian mothers differed significantly from German mothers with regard to emotional warmth and punishment. In terms of socialization goals, all immigrant mothers placed more emphasis on both performance/self-control, as well as positive social behavior for their children than mothers without migration backgrounds in Germany. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents the first example of how to systematically identify the submarine landslide source of a tsunami using an innovative hybrid approach. This ground-breaking method is developed to resolve the puzzle around the source mechanism of the mysterious tsunami observed on 6th February 2023 in the Eastern Mediterranean Sea. The tsunami followed the two inland Mw 7.8 and Mw 7.5 Türkiye–Syria earthquakes, which occurred consequently with a 9 h interval on this day. The first earthquake (Mw 7.8) had an epicentral distance of 90 km from the nearest coast, which is closer than the second one (Mw 7.5) to the coast and yet its crustal deformation was almost entirely limited to inland. Therefore, the co-seismic surface displacement generated by the earthquake was ruled out as the source of the tsunami, confirmed by numerical modelling. Here, we hypothesized that the tsunami was most likely generated by a submarine landslide triggered by the earthquake. Analysis of tide gauge observations revealed that the waves arrived from 27 min to 48 min after the first earthquake (Mw 7.8) at different coastal locations, implying that the potential submarine landslide was triggered by the first earthquake (Mw 7.8). Backward tsunami travel time mapping using tide gauge observations guided us to constrain the area of the potential landslide. We approximated the dimensions of the landslide using spectral analysis of the tsunami observations. Consequently, an iterative trial-and-error approach was employed to confirm the landslide source of the tsunami by defining various informed alternative landslide scenarios and applying numerical modeling. Modelling showed that a submarine landslide can reproduce the tsunami observations reasonably well. It is located on a steep slope of the seafloor approximately 50 km from Arsuz. The submarine landslide is estimated to have caused a seafloor deformation measuring approximately 16 km in length and 4.0 km in width. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Using a micro dataset from labour force survey of Turkey and employing a multinomial logistic regression, this paper examines the determinants of mere overeducation, mere field of study mismatch and full-mismatch (who are both overeducated and field of study mismatched simultaneously). The target group consists of full-time wage-based employees who graduated from higher education and are aged 20–65. The determinants of mismatch are analysed under four variable groups which are labour market context, demography, field of study and job-specific characteristics. In line with the earlier empirical evidence, we find that the unfavourable economic conditions at the time of entry into the labour market might affect the behavioural pattern of individuals while searching for a matching job. Moreover, the sharp increase in university graduates increased further the fierce competition for the limited jobs available in the labour market, and resulted in a high likelihood of mismatch especially for the recent graduates. In sum, the estimation results yield that any mismatch category is responsive to those determinants where fully-mismatched employees are more responsive. Hence, we propose that the policy implications should better focus on the full-mismatch category. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents new evidence on the causal link between fertility and female labor supply by focusing on how informal employment interacts with maternal labor supply. We employ an IV strategy based on an unused data source for twin births in Turkey|a large middle-income country with extensive labor informality. We find that, following the first birth, female labor supply declines significantly and mothers who drop out of labor force are mostly the informally employed ones. This is contrary to the perception that informal jobs might be easier to sustain during motherhood as they are more flexible. Following further increases in family size, formally employed mothers start dropping out of labor force and their hours of work also decline. Higher fertility also leads to lower wages and lower job search intensity among mothers. We document substantial differences between maternal versus paternal labor supply in response to changes in family size. Unlike mothers, fathers increase their labor supply, which mostly comes from elevated informal employment|possibly due to a decline in their reservation wages. As a result, wages decline, hours of work increase, and job search activity shifts from formal to informal search methods for fathers. These results suggest that higher fertility might be associated with increased vulnerabilities and high labor income risks in countries with pervasive labor informality. Our estimates are robust to using alternative IV specifications based on gender composition of siblings. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Mix design of asphalt concrete is carried out in order to produce a mixture of asphalt bitumen and aggregate that satisfies both minimum design requirements and cost-effectiveness. Marshall mix design, similar to other mix design methods, aims to determine an optimum mix for a given design criteria, having an optimum bitumen content, and has still been one of the most used asphalt mix design method in the world. Marshall mix design procedure requires significant amount of time and skilled workmanship for lengthy laboratory experiments. Time required for the mix design may negatively affect construction schedule especially during the peak construction season. In Marshall mix design procedure, optimum bitumen content is determined based on Marshall stability and flow test results, and other volumetric properties of the mixes. Prediction models that quickly predict all required Marshall mix design parameters based on very few numbers of input parameters requiring significantly less amount of time to obtain compared to the time needed to obtain all Marshall mix design parameters through lengthy laboratory experiments could be quite useful. In this study, artificial neural network-based prediction models based on the data of 200 asphalt mixes designed for asphalt wearing course, obtained from 5th district of the General Directorate of Highways of Turkey, were developed to predict all required Marshall mix design parameters. As part of the paper, a Microsoft Excel Macro-based tool, to be potentially used by 5th district of the General Directorate of Highways of Turkey, was also developed that makes prediction of all required mix design parameters for any given mix in seconds using the developed models and very few numbers of user-defined input parameters requiring significantly less amount time to obtain so that optimum bitumen content could be quickly determined. This will significantly reduce the amount of time and other resources required to determine optimum bitumen content. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper studies regional income convergence and its conditioning factors across 81 provinces of Turkey over the 2007–2019 period. Through the lens of a nonlinear dynamic factor model, we first test the hypothesis that all provinces would eventually converge to a common long-run equilibrium. We reject this hypothesis and find that the provincial dynamics of income per capita are characterized by 6 convergence clubs. Next, we evaluate the conditioning factors behind club formation. Our results suggest that spatial dependence across provinces plays an essential role in the formation of convergence clubs. The spatial distribution of the convergence clubs has a clear spatial pattern, and the dynamics of the provincial income distribution are spatially integrated. We also find that geographical neighbors are more important for middle and high-income provinces. Finally, we show that the performance of geographical neighbors affects the probability of club membership through spillovers in capital accumulation and structural change. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Road-traffic-based air pollution accounts for one-third of the air pollution problem in Turkey. In order to combat this environmental issue and illustrate the possible direction of the road transport policy, five scenarios of withdrawing older vehicles from the fleet are analyzed using cost–benefit analysis (CBA) for 2020–2030. This article focuses on CBA's economic dimension, while the cost of carbon and health costs are included to capture the integrated societal CBA. The economic net benefit is calculated based on tax revenues and foreign trade of major road transport factors such as fuel, vehicles, and scrap metal. The findings indicate that all alternative scenarios compared to the business-as-usual scenario result in a higher net benefit, ranging from 69 to 274 billion PPP US $, and justify implementing road-transport policies consistent with sustainable development goals to combat air pollution and ensure human health. This paper provides extensive evidence that vehicle fleet renewal is beneficial from economic, environmental, and public health perspectives. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper for the first time improved a Robust Multi-Output machine learning regression model for seismic hazard zoning of Turkey, Iraq and Iran using constructed 3-D shear-wave velocity (Vs), seismic tomography dataset model for the crust and uppermost mantle beneath the study area. The focus of this paper's opportunity is to develop a scientific framework leveraging machine learning that will ultimately provide the rapid and more complete characterization of earthquake properties. This work can be targeted at improving the seismic hazard zones system ability to detect and associate seismic signals, or at estimating other seismic characteristics (crust acceleration and crust energy) while traditionally, methods cannot monitor the earthquakes system. This work has derived some physical equations for extraction of many variables as inputs for our developed machine learning model based on a reliable understanding of the tomography data to physical variables by preparing huge dataset from different physical conditions of crust. We have extracted the velocity values of the shear waves from the original NETCDF file, which contains the S velocity values for every one km of the depths of the crust for the study area from one km down to the uppermost mantle beneath the Middle East. For the first time, this study calculated new seismic hazard parameter called Peak Crust Acceleration (PCA) for seismic hazard analysis by considering the transmitted initial seismic energy through the Earth's crust layers from hypocenter. All machine learning algorithms in this study wrote in python language using anaconda platform the open-source Individual Edition (Distribution). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Rural communities are intensively based on social capital, the potential of which might seem limited in terms of the possibility to expand beyond rural areas. Today, entrepreneurs, the main actors in achieving and sustaining rural development, have a unique opportunity in the exploitation of social capital in rural areas by utilizing the digital platforms. These new online entrepreneurs have become critical to the success of rural areas as they mobilize online resources to exploit the full potential of their local products in the global economy, thus remaining local while acting global. This process is illustrated by the development of the alternative food network as well as social networks that connect rural potential to the rest of the world. This paper aims to understand the role of such social networks in e-commerce by analysing entrepreneurial characteristics and the ecosystem of their enterprises through case studies. In addition, the network characteristics of chosen enterprises are examined under three main subjects: (i) types of relations with rural residents; (ii) relations with suppliers (both producers and logistics); and iii) the extent of their networks in the e-marketplace. Online entrepreneurs whose business is related to rural agricultural products are selected as case study examples. The data are derived from the results of interviews, and visuals are used to map out their entrepreneurial networks and ecosystems. The conclusions of this paper are: (i) by using online channels, rural entrepreneurs are able to broaden their market; (ii) agricultural lands are being protected since rural entrepreneurs use the potentials of local natural resources; and (iii) these enterprises are financially self-sustaining. The positive impact on local rural development by online rural entrepreneurs is obvious. However, to expand this impact on a regional scale, the promotion of public policies and planning are necessary. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Mudurnu County, situated in northwestern Turkey, is a prominent settlement area because it is located on major trade routes (i.e., the Silk Road and the Crimean Road) and has served as a trading town and a military base in the Byzantine, Seljuk, and Ottoman periods. Mudurnu County is affected by regional complex rock slope instabilities that pose a substantial hazard to the settlement area and generate regional risk to human life, buildings, houses, and industrial facilities. Mudurnu, because of its invaluable historical structures, has been nominated for the UNESCO World Heritage List. Yet, those historical structures are threatened by the rock instabilities. The aim of the paper is to characterize the rock mass on the western slopes of the Mudurnu Valley, through geomechanical evaluation of the rock and empirical assessment of the slope instabilities. The engineering geological and geomechanical properties of the area were acquired via a 3D point cloud together with field scan-line surveys. The western slope of the Mudurnu Valley was divided into 11 geomechanically uniform sectors. Classification of the sectors using the SMR and Q-slope methods demonstrated that the rock mass was prone to complex planar, wedge, and toppling failures. Proper identification of such complex failures was performed using a decision tree methodology. Estimation of the probabilities of the complex failures was accomplished using empirical classifications and field observations. It was found that Sector 8 was the most critical for combined toppling and wedge failures, as well as toppling with a combination of planar and wedge failures. In addition, Sector 6 was the most critical for combined toppling and planar failures. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The effects of global warming and climate change appear as increasing or decreasing trends in hydrometeorological records in different locations. Identifying trends in long-term (more than 30 year) data is possible through a variety of methodologies as well as classical Mann–Kendall (MK), Regression (R), Spearman's Rho (SR) methods in addition to the innovative trend analysis (ITA) approaches. The most used method in the literature is the MK trend determination test, but it has limited assumptions, and the trend slope is calculated according to Sen's median procedure. However, Sen's approach is an empirical methodology that considers a single median slope from all possible consecutive lag slopes. This paper provides the theoretical probability distribution function (PDF) that matches Sen's slopes, and an innovative probabilistic trend slope methodology is proposed with a set of slope risk levels, rather than statistical slope calculation. The application of the proposed methodology is presented for long-term Danube River annual discharge data in Romania and precipitation records at Antalya resort center in the south along the Mediterranean coast of Turkey. A set of trend lines, objectively different risk levels, are obtained. It has been determined that there are decreasing and increasing monotonic trends in each historical time series record. Therefore, for extreme events, it is possible to consider a particular risk level trend characteristic, i.e., floods and droughts, rather than the classical mean or median level trend definition. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper uses the severe economic crisis in Turkey in 2008-2009 as a quasi-experiment to evaluate the impact of worsening economic conditions during pregnancy on birthweight. Using birth history data from the 2008 and 2013 waves of the Demographic Health Surveys, we find that the economic crisis resulted in decreased birthweight in Turkey, especially impacting infants born to mothers with lower educational levels. Furthermore, a procyclical relationship exists between provincial income levels and the birthweight of infants born to mothers with lower levels of education. However, this relationship is only statistically significant during the crisis period. These results highlights how economic constraints on mothers with lower socio-economic status during economic crises can negatively affect birth outcomes. Furthermore, we examine shifts in fertility behavior and find a decrease in childbirth rates during the crisis, particularly in economically disadvantaged provinces. In line with this decrease in fertility, we also observe a reduced propensity to seek an abortion during the crisis period. Overall, these findings underscore the importance of understanding how economic crises affect infant health and the need for targeted interventions to support vulnerable populations, as well as addressing underlying socio-economic disparities to mitigate their impact on infant well-being. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents a parametric model to design five different types of Anatolian swallow roofs (SR) that help designers create complex designs by changing the plan size and height of rulesets and pre-defined constants with the whorled phyllotaxy of plants. After analyzing the different types of Anatolian SRs, the research continues with a detailed explanation of the parametric model. Two tests were applied to see the contribution and potentials of the model. While the first set of tests focuses on the modelling and material data gathering abilities, the second test checks the model's ability to study the knowledge of the past with an implementation in three Anatolian mosques. The research is finalized by discussing the tests' and model's findings and potentials. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Chiari malformation type III (CM III), a rare hindbrain anomaly, often presents with various concurrent anomalies. This paper reports a unique case of CM III associated with Klippel-Feil syndrome (KFS), a condition previously unreported in Saudi Arabia and documented in only one other case globally in Turkey. This study aims to share insights into the unusual association between CM III and KFS, considering their close embryological development and involvement in the craniocervical junction. Methodology: The study presents a case of a 2.5-year-old female diagnosed with CM III and KFS. Diagnostic tools such as ultrasound, CT scans, MRI, and physical examinations were used to confirm the patient's condition. Surgical interventions, including decompression and encephalocele repair, were performed. Results: Successful surgical interventions, including encephalocele repair and duraplasty, were carried out. Follow-up visits indicated a stable condition, marked improvement in lower limb strength, and the patient's ability to walk with assistance. CT follow-up affirmed a satisfactory surgical outcome. Conclusion: This case study illustrates the potential for an optimistic prognosis in CM III, even when accompanied by complex conditions such as KFS, through early diagnosis and intervention. It underscores the significance of antenatal screening for effective care planning and calls for further research and publications due to the rarity of this association. These findings contribute to our understanding of CM III and its related conditions, emphasizing the need for open-minded consideration of potential embryological associations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The solar photovoltaic (PV) plants in Türkiye have been advancing at a remarkable rate in the last decades because of the region's high solar energy potential. However, it is understood from the literature review that there are still limited research works on the optimization of the tilt angles of PV surfaces to maximize the solar radiation of the PV energy systems in this region. Therefore, this study focuses on a quantitative analysis of the optimal tilt angles of south-oriented PV surfaces and the amount of solar radiation collected by optimally tilted and tracked PV surfaces for all provinces by using the National Aeronautics and Space Administration-Surface meteorology and Solar Energy (NASA-SSE) horizontal radiation data for the provinces in Türkiye. Also, a numerical method is proposed to estimate the average daily solar radiation values falling on optimally tilted and tracked PV surfaces in 81 provinces and 7 geographical regions of Türkiye in this paper. An optimal tilt angles map has been created for all provinces where solar plants could be established. Solar data calculations have been carried out for all provinces, and the results are presented for the average total radiation amounts and percentage contributions that can be obtained in the case of installing fixed systems and tracking systems. It is found that the tilt angles of all provinces and regions are below the latitude values of Türkiye (36°′N–42°′N). Annual fixed optimal tilt angle values for south-facing PV surfaces are found between 28° and 36° throughout the year. It is observed that the daily average total radiation values falling on PV surfaces are considerably affected by the geographical and climatic characteristics even between the provinces with close latitude values in Türkiye. The results indicate that the tracking systems provide remarkable solar energy gains compared to the annual fixed systems. The proposed methodology can be used in the case of the implementation of a large-scale PV plant in any location in Türkiye, and this knowledge can be extended to the world thanks to low computational cost. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper studies the effects of reducing information uncertainty on matching outcomes in a college choice setting. Turkey reformed its college admissions in 1999, changing the preference submission process for 4-year programs from pre-exam to post-exam submission, both under the constrained Deferred Acceptance mechanism. A conceptual framework illustrates that the reform changed matching outcomes in two ways: (i) fewer programs with unfilled seats, (ii) more assortative matching between students and programs, i.e., higher cutoff ranks for more highly ranked programs. Results from a difference-in-differences strategy confirm such predictions and find that the reform led to less under-capacity among lower-ranked programs and stronger assortative matching between high-achieving students and highly ranked programs. Moreover, we find some suggestive evidence that the post-exam submission may have led to fewer enrolled students overall but more female students in 4-year programs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper seeks to identify the causal impact of educational human capital on social distancing behavior at workplace in Turkey using district-level data for the period of April 2020 - February 2021. We adopt a unified causal framework, predicated on domain knowledge, theory-justified constraints anda data-driven causal structure discovery using causal graphs. We answer our causal query by employing machine learning prediction algorithms; instrumental variables in the presence of latent confounding and Heckman's model in the presence of selection bias. Results show that educated regions are able to distance-work and educational human capital is a key factor in reducing workplace mobility, possibly through its impact on employment. This pattern leads to higher workplace mobility for less educated regions and translates into higher Covid-19 infection rates. The future of the pandemic lies in less educated segments of developing countries and calls for public health action to decrease its unequal and pervasive impact. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Even though health expenditures are one of the significant determinants of accumulation of human capital and economic growth, researchers have paid less attention to unveiling interactions between health care expenditures and economic performance. The main objective of this study is to investigate disaggregated health care expenditures and economic growth nexus in Türkiye from 1979 to 2019 by using an asymmetric causality approach. The main empirical findings could be briefly summed up as follows: there exist asymmetric causal effects running from total health expenditures, out-of-pocket health expenditures and voluntary health expenditures to economic growth, while there is no asymmetric causal effect from compulsory health expenditures to economic growth. The policy inferences of empirical results for enhancing the productivity of health expenditures are stated in the body of the paper. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Nowadays, logistics is one of the most important tools in disaster relief operations. The logistic planning is essential and a key component in covering the initial needs in the immediate aftermath of any disaster. Planning is both necessary and practical, as it is generally possible to predict the types of disasters that should affect a given location and the needs that such disasters will be likely to cause. Transport planning, reception and distribution of emergency supplies, type and quantity of the resources, the way of procurement and storage of the supplies, the tools of the tracking and means transportation to the stricken area, the specialization of teams participating in the operation and plan of cooperation between these teams, are some vital life-saving coordination roles after natural disasters are connected directly to logistic planning. Turkey is located in one of the most active earthquake and volcanic regions which causes to many major earthquake-prone, in the world with a majority of the population living in these earthquake-prone areas. Earthquakes are one of the major disasters that require emergency logistic planning strategies due to their devastating effects, the large-scale natural disasters could cause major problem on commodities such as food, medicine etc. In this paper, a game theoretical model for emergency logistic planning is developed. To do this a cooperative game model is constructed from a flow problem which occurred after an earthquake in Istanbul. Several solution concepts for maximizing the transferred commodity are given. The paper ends with a conclusion and outlook to future studies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: In December of 2019, a new disease which is caused by SARS-CoV-2, as an epidemic disease out of Wuhan, China, began to circulate. On March 11, 2020, the Republic of Turkey Ministry of Health had announced the first case from Turkey. The aim of this study is to analyze the scientific publications in the field of COVID-19 included in Science Citation Index Expanded (SCIE) from Turkey and to establish a theoretical background for future studies in the health literature with obtained valuable information about the publications. We searched all papers published in the field of COVID-19 by using the terms of "COVID-19," "2019-n-CoV," "SARS-CoV-2," "Coronavirus disease 19," and "2019 novel coronavirus" as scientific nomenclatures of COVID-19 in the topic search section of the software. Results: Overall, 47,368 papers, indexed by SCI-E, were found related to COVID-19 between January 1, 2020, and December 13, 2020. Of these, 931 were from Turkey. In terms of specialities, the most contribution was from the Medicine General Internal followed by Dermatology. Most of the publications were article. English was the most preferred language in papers. Dermatological Theraphy published the most paper. Conclusions: Applying this kind of analysis on an intermittent basis gives a general perspective for contribution of a countries to scientific publications and useful for the further studies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While the whole world struggles with the COVID-19 pandemic, there are many different measures taken by countries. In this sense, the distribution of free masks to citizens between the ages of 20–65 in Turkey is one of the important measures taken against to spread of the pandemic. This distribution process is carried out through pharmacies and people can obtain their masks from any pharmacy in their area of residence. However, this situation may cause some pharmacies to be very busy, and thus social distance cannot be maintained and health and safety of the people may be threatened. In this paper, we aim to prioritize pharmacies so that only determined pharmacies in certain regions perform mask distribution process to prevent virus transmission. For this purpose, Esenler district is taken into consideration for a pilot study which is one of the risky regions in terms of virus spread in Istanbul, Turkey. Multi-criteria decision-making approach (MCDM) is used because of the necessity of handling many factors in decision-making process and the contradiction of evaluation factors in the prioritization of pharmacies. In order to best model the uncertainty in the decision process, the MCDM approach is applied in a fuzzy environment. In addition, spherical fuzzy AHP and VIKOR MCDM approaches are used as novel hybrid method in this paper. As a result of spherical fuzzy multi-criteria analysis, the pharmacies that need to provide free mask distribution in the Esenler region have been successfully identified. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Cappadocia in Turkey is an important region with emphasis on ethnic and historic structures and geological features. Because of volcanic eruptions, ash flow materials deposited at different levels. These different colored ignimbrite levels have a wide range of geomechanical properties. In the region, the Kızılkaya ignimbrite covers a very large area and is frequently used as building dimension stone in for the restoration of old historical buildings such as churches, caravansaries and mosques as well as new buildings. It contains tuffaceous matrix with some minerals and rock fragments. The rock has variable character. In this study, the relationship between petrographic and physico-mechanical properties of the Kızılkaya ignimbrite was investigated. Rate of change between uniaxial compressive strength and the other index properties of the rock was statistically examined utilizing multiple regression analysis (MRA) and Artificial Neural Network (ANN) methods. The study has shown that uniaxial compressive strength (UCS) of the ignimbrite can be successfully estimated by the use of dry unit weight, effective porosity, sonic velocity, and grain matrix ratio (GMR) parameters. A new UCS prediction equation is proposed in this paper for the ignimbrite with variable character. Since properties of the ignimbrite at different distances from the eruption area changes significantly, the approach presented in this study can be considered for the ignimbrites especially covering a large area with different welding degrees and grains. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper aims to examine the impact of innovation activities on employment for Turkish manufacturing industry with a special focus on market structures. We utilize an endogenous switching technique which accounts for selection bias issues and endogeneity. We show that there exist employment gains from product innovations only for firms operating in highly concentrated sectors, whereas we cannot find evidence for low concentration sectors. Our results point out a negative association between process innovation and employment only for firms operating in high concentration sectors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Some of the key challenges for STEM education in Turkey include the problems encountered by teachers when integrating diverse disciplines and technologies into STEM activities, the need for teachers to acquire the skills necessary to prepare and implement appropriate STEM activities for the educational level of their students and their school context, the difficulties faced by teachers when following the Engineering Design (ED) problem-solving process in the implementation of STEM activities, and teachers' heavy workloads, which impede the collaboration required to develop and implement STEM activities. A field study was carried out in Samsun, Turkey between 2017 and 2018 to develop a Design Thinking (DT) approach customized to support STEM teachers. The field study adopted an action research methodology and involved two main studies with fifth-grade teachers and students, facilitated by a researcher-designer. Qualitative methods including co-design workshops, focus groups, interviews, and observation were employed to gather data. The paper presents a seven-step DT approach, customized to support pre-service and in-service secondary school teachers in collaboratively designing and implementing classroom STEM activities. The results indicate that structuring the STEM activity design as a specialized DT process provides a complementary framework. Collaboration among teachers in a structured STEM activity design process supports the integration of disciplines and the development of STEM activities that correspond to the students' level of knowledge and ability. Empathy building, which facilitates familiarization with other teachers and students, enhances collaboration among teachers and aids the development of STEM activities relevant to the students' level. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Immediately after the COVID-19 pandemic was declared by the World Health Organization on 11 March 2020, most countries took measures to prevent international human mobility. While the economic consequences of the pandemic significantly reduced remittances sent by migrants through formal channels, restrictions on human mobility almost halted the cross-border movements of remittances through informal channels. Policy measures related to the labour market and social welfare practices have also played determining roles in remittance transfers. This paper aims to examine how the labour-market participation of migrants and pandemic-induced financial support affect remittances sent migrants to their home countries during the COVID-19 outbreak. The author used an inductive approach and analysed qualitative data from two groups of Turkish migrants with different status in the UK labour market. The findings demonstrate that during the COVID-19 pandemic measures to restrict human mobility, migrants' income/job losses, and dependence on tightly regulated financial support can have devastating effects on remittances sent from the UK to Turkey through both formal and informal channels. This study contributes to remittance literature by evincing the vicious cycle of irregularity in the relationships among remittances, labour markets, and welfare regulations in host countries. In countries with a tight regulatory system, irregularity in the labour market brings about irregularities in money transfers. In possible future events where there is a high probability of an economic downturn and travel restrictions, such as pandemic, natural disasters, armed conflicts and so on, especially for migrants, it is important to set a minimum base wage which can be referred to as 'Temporary Basic Income Support'. This policy proposal is important as measures that facilitate remittance transfers through formal channels, are one of the most important means of reducing global inequalities and disadvantages. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the effects of quantitative easing (QE) announcements by emerging market central banks in Europe during the COVID-19 pandemic, particularly on exchange rates with a higher frequency setting. Two different methodologies are used for analysing the policy announcement effects. The first methodology is the event study method that measures the sample exchange rates' mean and cumulative mean abnormal return around the time of event. The second one is the time series approach that measures asymmetric behaviour of the exchange rate volatility to monetary policy shocks by employing exponential GARCH model. The results show that the foreign exchange markets respond to QE announcements in all selected countries. The response of exchange rates varies across countries and event windows. QE announcements cause appreciation of domestic currency in Hungary and Poland, and depreciation in Turkey. Additionally, the QE announcements increase exchange rate volatility in Hungary and Poland while they reduce volatility in Turkey. The asymmetric behaviour of domestic currencies prevails in all selected countries, but this asymmetry is sensitive to the exchange rate and the length of the window. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Diyarbakır city, in the torrid southeast Anatolia region, harbours significant socioeconomic potentials and a population of over 2 million. Climate factors affect human activities in the city due to heat stress in summer which increases with climate change. Therefore, it is important to analyse outdoor human thermal comfort conditions (OHTCCs) to take required actions for the sustainability and improvement of socioeconomic life. This paper evaluates OHTCCs for the city over a 10-year period for rural and semi-urban sites and 5-year period for urban site. Physiological Equivalent Temperature (PET) and RayMan, a bioclimate model, were chosen to determine OHTCCs from meteorological parameters. Results indicate that the frequency of heat stress is higher in urban (32.0%) than that in rural (25.6%) and in semi-urban (23.4%) sites while that of comfortable conditions is highest in urban (17.2%), followed by semi-urban (17.1%) and rural (15.8%) sites. Percentage of the cold stress is lowest (13.6%) in urban, followed by rural (21.4%) and semi-urban (22.4%) sites. High variability of summer heat stress over the sites can be explained by surface characteristics and local air circulation patterns. Semi-urban site provides some advantages for experiencing less heat stress since it has the mixed surface characteristics with vegetated and structured zones which can supply moisture to the environment to moderate OHTCCs. It is suggested that authorities should consider the urban planning and implementation actions to improve physical environment and human quality of life and to ensure the sustainability of economic activities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The present paper analyzes long term (1960–2021) of the minimum, maximum, and average temperatures in Central Anatolia Region, corresponding middle part of Turkey, aiming to reveal how strongly the temperatures increase, which is a precondition for sustainable development in this region. For this purpose, temporal trends, variability, and anomalies in temperatures of 27 meteorological stations were detected using Mann–Kendall test (M-K), coefficient of variations, and Gaussian filter, respectively. Results show a statistically significant increasing trend in annual average temperatures at approximately 92% of all stations. This shows that the increasing trend in spring and summer temperatures plays an important role in amplifying the warming trend of annual temperatures. The coefficients of variation in annual average, maximum, and seasonal temperatures increase from west to east. Significant strong increasing trend (at 0.001 level) in winter temperatures was detected only at Seydişehir. While positive anomalies have been observed in the northwestern part of the region since 2007, they have been observed in other parts since 1995–1996. Since the strong increase in summer temperatures in Aksaray, Cihanbeyli, and Seydişehir is also observed in autumn, warm conditions continue until the end of autumn in these settlements. For this reason, four seasons do not prominently occur for all three settlements. Generally, annual maximum and minimum temperatures illustrate statistically significant increasing trends for all stations and 74% of all stations, respectively. According to the M-K test results, climate of the region has warmed on average by 1.44 °C in last 31 years. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Research on happiness, in the meaning of the ultimate goal of people's lives, dates back to ancient times. Living well and creating suitable conditions to achieve happiness are essential issues in one's life. However, happiness is affected by many factors. The first thing that comes to mind is the psychological ones. Besides, many socio-economic satisfaction indicators and demographic profiles have an effect on establishing a happy environment. In this line, this paper aims to examine the relationship between the level of happiness and satisfaction indicators by employing multiple linear regression modelling to data from the 2019 Turkish Life Satisfaction Survey. The regression results reveal that the satisfaction indicators considered in this study, except satisfaction from education, significantly explain the happiness level. Admittedly, an increase in educational attainment also improves the level of happiness, however, educational attainment may be a source of unhappiness for especially Turkish people who are disappointed in working life. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper provides new insights into the growth-maximizing size of government in Turkey. Unlike previous studies that traditionally use the share of government spending in GDP as a proxy variable of government size, in this paper we consider a fairly large number of proxy variables ranging from the share of tax revenues in GDP to the share of public investment in total investment. After reviewing the potential non-linear relationship between government size and growth, we estimate various thresholds for government size that maximize growth. To this end, we use the threshold autoregressive model proposed by Hansen (1996: 413-430; 2000: 575-603)) and apply it to Turkey's annual time-series data for the period from 1974 to 2019. Overall, we arrive at the following main result: Government size is non-linearly related to growth, confirming the existence of a growth-maximizing threshold for any measure of government size, beyond which growth tends to slow down as government size continues to increase. More precisely, the results show that the estimated thresholds for government size lie within the range of 4.28–15.19%, depending on the definition or proxy variable representing government size. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The evolution of ensemble learning has recently offered a new approach to model complex systems. Inspired by the success of such methods, this paper introduces a new ensemble approach that integrates capabilities of two top state-of-the-art machine learning (ML) methods, namely random forests (RF) and genetic programming (GP), to model and forecast meteorological drought onset and severity. The new method, called gene-random forest (GeRF), follows the same steps of a standard GP systems, but with differences in the generation of initial population of potential solutions. The GeRF was tested to model and predict standardized precipitation evapotranspiration indices (SPEI-3 and SPEI-6) at two meteorology stations in Ankara province, Turkey. We have compared its efficiency to those of a classic autoregressive model as well as standalone RF, GP, and a hybrid ML model, called Bat-ELM, achieving results meaningfully superior to the benchmarks, particularly in the testing data. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The author of this paper has recently shown that daily-mean self-potential (SP) time series recorded at Urla station, Turkey, exhibit a unit-root nonstationary behavior with weakly correlated stationary differences driven by stable noise of tail index around 1.12–1.15. This work mainly aims to assess whether the Exponentiated-Exponential Cauchy (EEC) family distributions could be utilized as an alternative to the stable distributions. The EEC family distributions have many advantages as they have closed-form representations. Those goodness-of-fit statistics, relative strengths and predictive abilities of the three EEC family distributions with two- (Cauchy), three- (EEC-3) and four (EEC-4) parameters were compared with that of the stable one. The Akaike Information Criterion (AIC)-based relative strength for the EEC-3 candidate indicated that it is approximately 1.85 times more likely to be the best approximating model than the stable one. Additionally, those considerably smaller relative mean absolute errors (RMAE) for the EEC-3 model indicated that the asymptotic tail properties of the empirical distribution could be better represented in comparison with the stable model. The results of this work revealed, on the example of Urla, that an EEC-3 distribution would plausibly the stable one. We hope the findings of this paper would provide many advantages and facilitate the numerical computations in solving problems arising from the use of stable laws. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]