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There is increasing attention on the intersection of sports and politics, with a particular focus on tying owners’ political donations to organization-level outcomes. However, the extant research leverages within-league panels of donations over time, so we know little about inter-league heterogeneities of political donations. Furthermore, extant work does not explicitly investigate the effect of election cycles on owners’ donation patterns. These limitations create questions about the generalizability and model robustness of current research. This paper analyzes N = 2,789 donations made by 158 team owners across six professional sport leagues during the 2016, 2018, and 2020 election cycles. Models suggest that donations from WNBA owners were significantly smaller and went to more progressive recipients on average than donations from owners in other leagues. Results also suggest that donations from WNBA, NASCAR, and NHL owners became significantly more moderate during presidential election cycles than during the midterm election cycle. Implications for future research are discussed.

Is it in the interest of a developing country to promote strong local linkages for domestic industries or to participate in global value chains (GVCs) wherein linkages are globally dispersed? This paper informs this debate by empirically analyzing which one of these strategies would result in higher levels of domestic value added (DVA) and employment in India. Using a unique panel data on DVA and jobs tied to Indian exports from 112 sectors for the period 1999–2000 to 2012–2013, we show that greater backward GVC participation—use of imported inputs to produce for exports—leads to higher absolute levels of gross exports, DVA and employment. This result implies that labor abundant countries can reap dividends by adopting policies aimed at strengthening their backward participation in GVCs. Our findings are robust to various estimation techniques and instrumental variable approaches to address potential endogeneity concerns. Supplementary Information The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s10290-021-00452-z.

Purpose The development of assistive technologies that support people in social interactions has attracted increased attention in HCI. This paper presents a systematic review of studies of Socially Assistive Systems targeted at older adults and people with disabilities. The purpose is threefold: (1) Characterizing related assistive systems with a special focus on the system design, primarily including HCI technologies used and user-involvement approach taken; (2) Examining their ways of system evaluation; (3) Reflecting on insights for future design research. Methods A systematic literature search was conducted using the keywords “social interactions” and “assistive technologies” within the following databases: Scopus, Web of Science, ACM, Science Direct, PubMed, and IEEE Xplore. Results Sixty-five papers met the inclusion criteria and were further analyzed. Our results showed that there were 11 types of HCI technologies that supported social interactions for target users. The most common was cognitive and meaning understanding technologies, often applied with wearable devices for compensating users’ sensory loss; 33.85% of studies involved end-users and stakeholders in the design phase; Four types of evaluation methods were identified. The majority of studies adopted laboratory experiments to measure user-system interaction and system validation. Proxy users were used in system evaluation, especially in initial experiments; 42.46% of evaluations were conducted in field settings, primarily including the participants’ own homes and institutions. Conclusion We contribute an overview of Socially Assistive Systems that support social interactions for older adults and people with disabilities, as well as illustrate emerging technologies and research opportunities for future work.

This paper discusses the scope for international macroprudential policy coordination in a financially integrated world economy. It begins with a review of the transmission channels associated with, and the empirical evidence on, financial spillovers and spillbacks. Limitations of the existing literature are also identified. The potential gains associated with cross-border macroprudential coordination, dwelling on both recent analytical contributions and quantitative studies based on multi-country models with financial frictions, are then evaluated. The issue of whether coordination of macroprudential policies simultaneously requires some degree of monetary policy coordination is also discussed. The analysis focuses on the potential for policy coordination between major advanced economies and a group identified as systemically-important middle-income countries (SMICs). Next, practical ways to promote international macroprudential policy coordination are considered. Following a discussion of Basel III’s Principle of reciprocity and ways to improve it, the paper advocates a further strengthening of the current statistical, empirical and analytical work conducted by international financial institutions to evaluate, and raise awareness of, the gains from international coordination of macroprudential policies.

In recent years, there has been a growing interest in the use of reference conceptual models to capture information about complex and sensitive business domains (e.g., finance, healthcare, space). These models play a fundamental role in different types of critical semantic interoperability tasks. Therefore, domain experts must be able to understand and reason with their content. In other words, these models need to be cognitively tractable. This paper contributes to this goal by proposing a model clustering technique that leverages on the rich semantics of ontology-driven conceptual models (ODCM). In particular, we propose a formal notion of Relational Context to guide the automated clusterization (or modular breakdown) of conceptual models. Such Relational Contexts capture all the information needed for understanding entities "qua players of roles" in the scope of an objectified (reified) relationship (relator). The paper also presents computational support for automating the identification of Relational Contexts and this modular breakdown procedure. Finally, we report the results of an empirical study assessing the cognitive effectiveness of this approach.

This paper characterises the conventional and the digital sector of the EU economy since the late 90s and introduces a two sector growth model which highlights structural differences between the two sectors. In contrast to conventional goods and services, digital goods and services are more easily scalable but require more upfront intangible investment. These features require consideration of fixed costs and a departure from perfect competition and raise issues about market entry. Another important dimension is the skill demand of both sectors, with the latter requiring a larger share of workers with digital skills. Since COVID-19 is expected to induce a persistent increase of demand for digital services, we use this model to estimate the likely economic impacts. We are in particular interested how the digital transition is affecting the labour market and the functional distribution of income. The paper shows how the distribution of economic rents between workers with digital skills and platforms is determined by labour supply conditions and entry barriers. This suggests that there is a role for competition policy and labour market policies to support the digital transition.

Structural determination of N-glycans by mass spectrometry is ideally performed by negative ion collision-induced dissociation because the spectra are dominated by cross-ring fragments leading to ions that reveal structural details not available by many other methods. Most glycans form [M – H]- or [M + adduct]- ions but larger ones (above approx. m/z 2000) typically form doubly charged ions. Differences have been reported between the fragmentation of singly and doubly charged ions but a detailed comparison does not appear to have been reported. In addition to [M + adduct]- ions (this paper uses phosphate as the adduct) other doubly, triply, and quadruply charged ions of composition [Mn + (H2PO4)n]n- have been observed in mixtures of N-glycans released from viral and other glycoproteins. This paper explores the formation and fragmentation of these different types of multiply charged ions with particular reference to the presence of diagnostic fragments in the CID spectra and comments on how these ions can be used to characterize these glycans. Graphical abstract

This paper explores the impact of infrastructure on trade connectivity among ASEAN and three Asian countries—India, China, and Japan. Our study is mainly motivated by the increased infrastructure investment and trade among these countries in recent years. The main results of trade network analysis include high trade density and interconnectedness among ASEAN, India, China, and Japan. There are specific “trade intensive paths” among the few countries in the group. It highlights the “export hubs” or main “suppliers of intermediate goods” in the region. Further, the paper analyzed the nexus between trade connectivity and infrastructure by applying the panel fixed effects method and Poisson pseudo-maximum likelihood. Moreover, the robustness of the results is tested by estimating two-stage least square. Hard infrastructure, foreign direct investment plays a crucial role in bringing the nexus to trade connectivity. Reducing trade barriers and improving infrastructure quality are essential for deepening regional trade integration.

To optimally tailor atopic dermatitis (AD) care to patients’ needs, especially considering the many emerging therapeutic options, insight into patients’ needs and preferences regarding AD care is needed. To explore patients’ needs and preferences regarding AD care, a qualitative study consisting of three focus groups with a total of 20 adult AD patients was conducted. All sessions were transcribed verbatim and inductively analyzed using several phases of coding to create an overview of patients’ needs and preferences. AD patients emphasized the need for a patient-tailored approach in all identified aspects of AD care. With regard to consultations, patients stressed the need for a personal approach and increased recognition of the disease impact, which should mainly be determined by patients. With regard to the organization of AD care, the need for psychosocial and medical supportive care as well as quick access to health-care providers during disease flares was emphasized. Within the decision-making process, patients indicated that the provided information, the role of the patient and physician, whether or not treatment goals should be set, and decisive factors for indication and feasibility of novel therapies should be patient dependent. AD care should be patient tailored with increased attention for the psychosocial burden, as well as better access to health care during disease flares. To provide patient-tailored care, the personal situation, needs, and preferences of the patient should be taken into account in the therapeutic decision-making process, with respect for the autonomy of the patient. Supplementary Information The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s00403-021-02321-z.

In his 2016 essay “An American Utopia,” Fredric Jameson appropriates Lenin’s concept of “dual power” to ruminate on its potential meaning in the present U.S. context. Jameson’s remarks on “dual power” and U.S. politics offer a starting point to explore both the most recent developments in the U.S. and to revisit Lenin’s State and Revolution fruitfully to review the concept of “the commune” as a post-capitalist political theory. Lenin’s work transcends anodyne demands for abstract democracy. Indeed, my intervention aims to explore the limits of “democracy” in U.S. political discourse, demanding a reconsideration of Leninist political theory. In so doing, the conditions of struggle in the U.S. potentialize the dialectical development of struggles to extend democracy (reform) with struggles to overcome democracy (revolution).