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The work-from-home blues have a secret source: nostalgia

Jennifer Anzaldi — Thu, 19 Sep 2024 14:25:23 +0000

The work-from-home blues have a secret source: nostalgia Jennifer Anzaldi Thu, 09/19/2024 - 10:25

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For at least two years, CEOs have been trying to bring employees back to the office, citing remote work’s supposed negative effects on productivity, morale, and creative collaboration. Managers, we’re told, are having a hard time monitoring and motivating dispersed teams. But what if bringing employees back to the office won’t put the genie back in the bottle?

Kevin Rockmann, professor of management at the Donald G. Costello College of Business at ��AV, argues that the furor over remote work masks deeper cultural issues at play in many organizations. This cultural malaise has employees pining for an imagined past where they felt grounded and connected with their colleagues. In short, remote workers aren’t unmanageable—they’re suffering from pangs of nostalgia.

Kevin Rockmann

Rockmann’s recently published research paper in Journal of Management (co-authored by Jessica Methot of Rutgers University and Emily Rosado-Solomon of Babson University) documents the results of surveys conducted during the height of Covid (September 2020). The thrice-daily surveys were delivered over a two-week period to 110 full-time professionals. Respondents were asked to report on their feelings of nostalgia, as well as emotional coping strategies, task performance, and counterproductive work behaviors (e.g. withholding support from colleagues and stealing time from their employer).

The overwhelming majority of participants (98 out of 110) admitted to experiencing nostalgia for life before Covid. And these feelings could have either positive or negative outcomes, depending on how the respondents dealt with them. Rockmann points to two pathways that showed up across the surveys as a whole, which he labels “approach” and “avoid.”

One way respondents reacted to nostalgia was to use so-called “cognitive change” strategies, which help regulate emotions through shifts in perspective. For example, someone feeling sad about being trapped at home during the pandemic could think to themselves, “It could be so much worse. At least I don’t have Covid like so many others.” These strategies seemed to evoke empathetic responses, leading the survey participants to reach out to colleagues to check in or offer assistance.

Equally prevalent in Rockmann’s results, however, was a much darker pathway. Instead of reaching out to others in response to nostalgia, respondents tended to turn inward in an attempt to minimize the emotional discomfort. Psychological researchers call this sort of reaction “attentional deployment.” “It’s a defense mechanism whereby you don’t feel you have the means to really connect with others, so you leverage your attention away from the source of pain,” Rockmann explains. This pathway led to incidents of “acting out”—the above-mentioned counterproductive work behaviors.

Rockmann says these Covid-era findings remain relevant for at least two reasons. First, survey respondents’ written comments sound like they could have been written yesterday, rather than four years ago. Common nostalgic themes revolved around co-workers, the structure of co-located work, etc.—all oft-heard plaints of remote workers in 2024. Second, the normalization of remote work well predated Covid—as Rockmann’s past research on the topic has documented. Covid accelerated an inevitable transition that was already well underway. Therefore, workers of a certain age would likely be feeling some nostalgia, even if there had never been a Covid pandemic.

“While return-to-office may make sense for some companies, I would emphasize that nostalgia cannot be fixed that way. Nostalgia is about longing for the past—or, more accurately, longing for a return to how we remember the past, usually through rose-colored lenses.”

How can organizations help employees conquer nostalgia, or at least encourage healthier ways of coping with nostalgia? The obvious answer might be what CEOs are trying to do—end remote work altogether. “While return-to-office may make sense for some companies, I would emphasize that nostalgia cannot be fixed that way. Nostalgia is about longing for the past—or, more accurately, longing for a return to how we remember the past, usually through rose-colored lenses,” Rockmann says.

Any political demagogue will tell you that people are most susceptible to nostalgia when they feel isolated and afraid. The fact that nostalgia is so widespread in today’s workplace would seem to confirm Rockmann’s past research showing how organizational cultures fail to promote positive relationships among employees.

Combating the nostalgia epidemic will require a cultural reset for many organizations. “Managers will need to engage much more closely with employees, asking sensitive questions (e.g. “What do you miss about working here before Covid?”) and co-creating individualized solutions to help employees fully adjust to the major changes in their working environment,” Rockmann says.

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George Mason team identifies technology to enhance artificial photosynthesis

Colleen Rich — Tue, 17 Sep 2024 18:12:52 +0000

George Mason team identifies technology to enhance artificial photosynthesis Colleen Rich Tue, 09/17/2024 - 14:12

When a 4-VA Collaborative Research Grant results in the production of a novel concept for technology solutions to support energy and climate issues, while also sharing resources and data between higher education institutions in Virginia and providing faculty and student research opportunities, it is a win for all involved.

Yun Yu. Photo provided

This was achieved following 4-VA’s approval of a proposal by ��AV’s Yun Yu, an assistant professor in the Chemistry and Biochemistry Department, for a grant titled “Nanoscale Visualization of Electrocatalytic Carbon Dioxide Reduction Activity at Cu Nanocatalysts.”

Yu’s goal was to investigate options in catalytic electrode materials to improve and enhance electrocatalysis, a process essential for harnessing sustainable energy sources for artificial photosynthesis. While nanostructures are currently recognized as the most successful catalyst for many chemical reactions, there is more to understand about tailoring their crystalline planes to improve activity and selectivity.

Yu wanted to gain deeper insights into various nanocatalysts used in carbon removal technologies. The conventional approach to conducting this study often involves measuring the entire catalyst, composed of numerous small particles with varying sizes and shapes. However, critical information, such as the impact of heterogeneities on performance, is often lost in such ensemble measurements.

Yu saw the potential for leveraging the nanoscale scanning electrochemical microscopy at George Mason to obtain detailed surface reactivity maps of nanocatalysts. However, to do so, Yu needed to acquire shape-controlled nanostructures, including copper nanowires, copper nanocubes, and nickel–iron layered nanosheets. He did so through a partnership with Sen Zhang, associate professor of chemistry at the University of Virginia.

Graduate student Dan Tran operating the scanning electrochemical microscope. Photo provided

Yu’s team—graduate student Dan Tran and undergraduate students Solyip Kim, Melissa Nguyen, and Mackenzie Dickinson—played a key role in the project, receiving funding and real-world research experience. Together, they identified furfural reduction, an important reaction for sustainable biofuel generation, and they noted a distinct contrast in activity between copper and graphite support.

“These preliminary experiments have demonstrated the viability of our scanning electrochemical technique in spatially resolving catalytic activity across nanoscopic structures,” said Yu. They further expanded the application to the study of nickel–iron catalysts.

“Our data suggested that adding trace amount of cerium oxide to the catalysts significantly enhances water oxidation activity. We would not have these insights without this powerful electroanalytical technique,” said Yu.

The initial results have provided Yu with a springboard to develop external grant proposals to systematically study the role of cerium oxide and quantify the effects of its loading on the apparent catalytic activity of the developed catalysts.

“This 4-VA opportunity allowed us to create a partnership with UVA, create a team to implement further investigation via George Mason’s nanoscale scanning electrochemical microscopy, and now apply for further funding to move this project forward,” Yu said.

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Folklore professor traveled around the world in 90 days for research project

Shayla Brown — Mon, 16 Sep 2024 17:14:29 +0000

Folklore professor traveled around the world in 90 days for research project Shayla Brown Mon, 09/16/2024 - 13:14

��AV professor Lisa Gilman lived in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) from the time she was born until she was 9 years old.

“I had a fantastic time there. I loved playing with my friends, eating the food, and listening to the music, but there was also war and conflict going on at the same time. I asked myself, how can those environments coexist?” she said.

Children learning art at Salama Africa in the Dzaleka Refugee Camp In Malawi. Photo by Lisa Gilman.

It was this question that encouraged Gilman to pursue her research of migrants and displaced people who have been affected by war and trauma with her project, “My Culture, My Survival: Arts Initiatives by Refugees for Refugees.”

Gilman, who has been working on this project for three years, was funded by a State Department Council of American Overseas Research Centers Multi-Country Research Fellowship to do 90 days of research in the 2024-2025 academic year.

“I'm really interested in using art as a way to talk about and explore politics, economics, and gender issues, specifically how people on the ground use art to actively interact with and respond to what's going on around them,” said Gilman, an English professor and director of the Folklore Program in the College of Humanities and Social Sciences.

Members of Syrian women le choir Haneen rehearsing in Gaziantep, Türkiye. Photo by Lisa Gilman.

For Gilman, this can include professionally trained artists or people sitting around and singing out of tune together. “Even people cooking food from their culture and passing those skills down to their children is a creative cultural dimension of life,” she said.

The refugee camp in Malawi, one setting Gilman is researching, includes people from the DRC who fled conflict, which Gilman said “brought me back full circle to all of those childhood experiences.”

“My grandfather was basically a refugee and [the more] I'm working on this research, I realize how profound that is for me,” said Gilman.

Gilman is also conducting research with Uyghurs in France, Syrians in Türkiye, several groups in the United States, and Rohingya in Bangladesh

A product of this research is The Dzaleka Art Project, a community-based collaboration. Gilman coordinated with artists in the camp and George Mason students to produce a website and book manuscript project by and about artists living as refugees in the Dzaleka camp in Malawi. This summer, Gilman was able to travel across the globe completing the research she needs to write the book.

Designed to share the positive stories of the people in the camp, the website includes artists’ bios, images of their art work, and information about life in the camp and the status of refugees in Malawi.

The website was produced by Gilman’s student research assistant, junior information technology major Solomon Tejan Kanu. “I learned a great deal about the backgrounds and hardships of the migrants,” said Tejan Kanu, who as a child, immigrated to the United States from Sierra Leone as a refugee.

“I heard so many tragic stories during my interviews, but also learned a lot about their artistic talents,” he said.

Tejan Kanu worked closely with other undergraduate and graduate students, including senior government and international politics student Brendan West, on the project.

“We conducted a lot of background research with Professor Gilman, finding communities such as Syrian migrants and Uyghurs in Europe,” said West, who joined Gilman as a research assistant in February of 2022.

Rwandan traditional dance rehearsal in the Dzaleka refugee camp in Malawi. Photo by Lisa Gilman.

“She mentored me in an incredible way that positively influenced the direction of my professional career. Before this project, I didn't really understand the experience of migrants and permanently displaced people,” said West. “I'm definitely more interested in working in government on refugee policy in the future because of the impact this project had on my worldview.”

Gilman is currently a Fellow at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars where she is completing the book “My Culture, My Survival,” scholarly articles, and public-facing work that highlights the creativity, agency, and entrepreneurship of forcibly displaced artists from each of the five countries.

“This project is all about people; what they're doing with art and how they're talking about what art does for them and for others,” said Gilman. “We want to help tell their stories.”

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How nano roughness could smooth out clotting risks

Nathan Kahl — Thu, 05 Sep 2024 18:39:25 +0000

How nano roughness could smooth out clotting risks Nathan Kahl Thu, 09/05/2024 - 14:39

When doctors and medical technicians place a device in the human body, any number of things can go wrong. Ensuring the materials used in those devices interact appropriately and safely with human tissue is a key component to positive long-term health outcomes.

Ketul Popat, chair bioengineering department.
Photo by Office of University Branding

Ketul Popat, chair of the ��AV Department of Bioengineering and a medical materials expert, has a grant from the National Institutes of Health for approximately $200,000 to address an unintended consequence of device implementation—blood clots.

As many as 6% of the more-than one million Americans who have a stent or heart valve implanted each year face a risk of thrombosis, a potentially deadly condition occurring when a clot blocks a blood vessel. For Popat and his collaborators, it’s not just about what the material is made of, but the nature of the very surface of the material.

But Popat said, “Sometimes we just put materials in the body because they work, knowing they are going to fail in several years and we’ll replace them. So it becomes really important to design the surface of the material of an implant so that when it is in contact with tissue, it is not a mismatch to the structural features of the tissue.”

Our blood’s ability to clot is generally a welcomed response, preventing excessive bleeding following an injury and helping to start and speed the healing process. Of course, this characteristic can also be problematic, resulting in clots that can lead to strokes, heart attacks, and other dangers.

A depiction of a stent in a vein. iStock photo

Popat believes a way to decrease clotting that may occur because of the devices is with surface manipulation, tricking the blood cells, in a sense. “Rough surfaces have different clotting properties than smooth surfaces. Now if we can create rough surfaces that are systematic and repeatable, the cells in the blood will sense these nano features and perform their function differently than if they move past a flat surface.” Popat says he and colleagues believe the nano rough surfaces work well at reducing blood clots because blood cells are used to it–surfaces of the blood vessels they flow through have a similar nanostructure.

Microscopic image of titania nanotubes on the surface of titanium, each measuring approximately 100 nanometers across. Photo provided

In addition to manipulating the surface material, the researchers are coating them with a substance tanfloc, a condensed tannin that is typically used for water purification. Previous studies show that the combination of these techniques–rough nanosurfaces covered in tanfloc–reduces the likelihood of blood clots.

The unpredictability of clotting makes this research particularly important, especially in a world where approximately 20 million people die every year due to cardiovascular disease.

“Some people get a stent, and they are fine for the rest of their lives, and some people get a stent and in the first few years they experience blood clotting. It’s very patient-specific, and unfortunately you just don’t know until you put it in,” Popat said.

Popat said the goal goes beyond simply preventing the clots. “Eventually, we want the cells around the stent to grow on top of the stent and over it. We don’t just want to control clotting, but we also want the stent to truly integrate with, and become part of, the body.”

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University Professor Faye S. Taxman Earns Additional $16.5 Million Grant

Andrew J Schappert — Wed, 04 Sep 2024 17:32:12 +0000

University Professor Faye S. Taxman Earns Additional $16.5 Million Grant Andrew J Schappert Wed, 09/04/2024 - 13:32

The National Institutes of Health awarded another $16.5 million to the Justice Community Opioid Innovation Network (JCOIN), led by ��AV Professor Faye S. Taxman. Taxman directs the Center for Advancing Correctional Excellence! within the Schar School of Policy and Government and spearheaded the establishment of JCOIN in 2018 to improve the treatment of opioid use disorders. This additional funding will allow the research network to expand its focus beyond opioids to substance abuse disorders more generally.

Faye S. Taxman. Photo by Office of University Branding

Comprising 12 research hubs and two resource centers, JCOIN promotes research into the treatment and management of opioid use disorder, particularly in individuals within the justice system. Taxman explains that, while each research hub has its own studies, her Coordination and Translation Center (CTC) works to “translate what we know works best, according to science, to targeted audiences that can implement them.”

Since its inception in 2018, the JCOIN team has worked alongside a variety of stakeholders including health care professionals, social workers, and police officers, as well as county jails, probation agencies, and judicial courts. By disseminating new research findings and identifying best practices, Taxman’s team bridges the gap between scholarship and practical application, strengthening the positive impact of the research that JCOIN produces and maximizing the value of the taxpayer funding the network receives.

Engaging stakeholders in the process of translating scientific research has helped “generate new ideas about topics we need to research, and issues that we need to develop new materials for, to really advance the field,” and even, “opened our eyes to new barriers that we hadn’t even thought about,” Taxman said, including the social stigma surrounding professionals who work in this field.

With this newest round of funding, JCOIN is rebranding itself as the Justice Community Overdose Innovation Network, reflecting the expanding scope of its research and dissemination efforts.

“Over 130,000 people [across the United States and Canada] die each year due to overdoses,” Taxman said, “and overdoses are one the highest categories—even more than gun violence—for fatalities in our country; it cuts across all socioeconomic statuses.”

Substance abuse is a national epidemic “that affects everyone in our society. You usually can’t find anyone that doesn’t know someone who has had an alcohol or substance use disorder,” she said.

By connecting empirical research in partnership with practitioners in the field, JCOIN is ideally situated to alleviate the problems of addiction and substance abuse that plague communities across the United States.

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Schar School Welcomes Thema Monroe-White

Andrew J Schappert — Wed, 04 Sep 2024 15:54:33 +0000

Schar School Welcomes Thema Monroe-White Andrew J Schappert Wed, 09/04/2024 - 11:54

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‘We’ve talked about the data harm. I want to get at the solutions.’ – Thema Monroe-White

Thema Monroe-White joins ��AV this fall as an associate professor in both the Schar School and the College of Engineering and Computing. She is an artificial intelligence (AI) and policy justice scholar and the recipient of a prestigious $1 million CAREER grant, awarded by the National Science Foundation (NSF) to early-career faculty who are trailblazers within their field.

Monroe-White focuses on the intersection of science, policy, and racial equity, working to combat bias within data science and AI by building a diverse scientific workforce. Her CAREER grant, entitled “Investigating Undergraduate Student Persistence Intentions for a Diverse Data Science Community,” is a huge step toward her goal of developing social inclusion in the scientific community. Monroe-White will investigate which interventions are most effective in encouraging underrepresented students to choose STEM majors, graduate, and subsequently stay in STEM careers. “I want to develop concrete, practical approaches for broadening participation in data science and related fields,” says Monroe-White. “Why do students persist in STEM, and how can we codify those conditions to encourage even more underrepresented students to pursue STEM careers?”

The CAREER grant builds on another NSF-funded project Monroe White brings to Mason, which examines how scientists’ background and experience influence the research topics they choose to pursue. Monroe-White's team has illustrated that a homogeneous workforce in STEM fields results in a less comprehensive exploration of scientific topics. Just as medical research focused on white male subjects until more women and researchers of color achieved authority in the field, Monroe-White's research exposes similar patterns in other fields. Preliminary research focused on scientists in the United States, and the team will now refine their algorithm and apply it to an international dataset.

Monroe-White brings her expertise in AI to George Mason at time when the university is investing in AI research and innovation. The Schar School recently secured two other seven-figure AI-related grants, one from the Department of Defense and another to create the nation’s first Center for AI Innovation for Economic Competitiveness (CAIIEC).

“Thema Monroe-White’s research understands the computational, social, and policy issues that underline artificial intelligence,” said J.P. Singh, Schar School Distinguished University Professor and principal investigator for CAIIEC. “She will greatly help us bridge disciplinary divides and train the next generation of student scholars to address the cutting-edge issues of our times.”

Monroe-White's research and teaching agenda focus both on revealing algorithmic bias and realizing AI’s capacity for positive social transformation. This will be the center of her contributions to George Mason’s new undergraduate program in technology policy, an innovative split between computer science and policy studies. In her fall course, AI: Ethics, Policy, & Society, Monroe-White asks, “Must AI tools reflect reality?” Algorithms learn from the data they are given and reflect the biases embedded in that data.

“We’ve talked about the data harms. I want to get at the solutions,” she said when asked about her goals at George Mason. “How do we round that corner and, instead of stereotyping subordination and omission, how do we get at empowerment and uplift?” AI is a powerful tool – one that has caused harm but also has enormous potential to reverse previous harms. As part of the Schar School, Monroe-White will train the next generation of computer scientists and policy practitioners to build that future.

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When expressing gratitude, it’s all in the timing

Jennifer Anzaldi — Wed, 04 Sep 2024 14:42:32 +0000

When expressing gratitude, it’s all in the timing Jennifer Anzaldi Wed, 09/04/2024 - 10:42

Thanks so much for reading this article all the way to the end! No, that wasn’t an editorial error. It’s a savvy managerial motivation strategy lurking somewhere in almost every employee’s inbox or Slack channel.

Mandy O’Neill, an associate professor of management at the Donald G. Costello College of Business at ��AV, has discovered a potential new addition to the annals of managerial motivation techniques: anticipatory gratitude.

Mandy O'Neill

We all know that thanking people for a job well-done, or a much-needed favor, is an effective form of positive reinforcement. Psychology researchers classify gratitude as a “socially engaging emotion” that promotes prosocial behavior and strong interpersonal relationships. In the course of exploring how employees cope with high-stress or frustrating work situations, O’Neill and her co-author Hooria Jazaieri of Santa Clara University discovered an interesting wrinkle in what we thought we knew about this popular emotion: Gratitude can be used as a form of emotion regulation and, when expressed ahead of time instead of after the fact, can produce that extra “oomph” when it comes to employee resilience and persistence.

Their paper is in press at Academy of Management Discoveries.

The researchers stumbled upon the power of anticipatory gratitude while researching organizational culture and change within the intensive care units of a leading U.S. hospital. It’s difficult to imagine a more gut-wrenching, high-stakes work environment: The ICU units in question receive what one employee called “the sickest of the sickest” from throughout the region. To decompress and process their emotions after especially difficult shifts, employees routinely emailed the group using an internal listserv. O’Neill and Jazaieri were forwarded four years’ worth of messages, which they analyzed with the help of direct experience gained from extensive site visits to the hospital.

In addition to writing heartfelt outpourings of post facto gratitude, ICU colleagues thanked one another for rising to occasions that had not yet occurred. Some of these emails were pre-emptively apologetic (“I may have to take a day or two off from time to time…Thank you for your patience and understanding”). Others seemed to function as pep talks, inspiring teams to keep up the good work (“Thank you…for bringing your a-game to work every day”).

As O’Neill describes it, “The ‘thanks in advance’ phenomenon involves an awareness that you’re going to be annoyed or upset by what I’m asking you to do, so I infuse you with the positivity of that feeling you get when someone expresses gratitude to you. Think about it as an emotional buffer. It helps with the inevitable distress of the task that’s going to happen later. It makes those negative emotions less salient, less powerful, and less insidious.”

The researchers launched several follow-up studies to learn more about the effects of anticipatory gratitude. They chose a context—Amazon’s Mechanical Turk (MTurk) gig-work platform—that was in many ways the polar opposite of the ICU. “You go from the ultimate interdependent work environment to the ultimate transactional work environment,” O’Neill explains.

“The ‘thanks in advance’ phenomenon involves an awareness that you’re going to be annoyed or upset by what I’m asking you to do, so I infuse you with the positivity of that feeling you get when someone expresses gratitude to you. Think about it as an emotional buffer."

The MTurk workers were assigned to solve extremely difficult puzzles. After completing the paid task, they received negative feedback about their performance and were offered the opportunity to do additional puzzles without being paid. MTurkers who had seen a message of gratitude before the main task voluntarily took on significantly more unpaid work than those who received a similar message after the paid exercise.

“What’s so compelling and surprising for us is that anyone who does work with experienced online gig worker populations knows it’s nearly impossible to induce workers to go beyond their assignment, even by 30 extra seconds, which is about what we were asking for,” O’Neill says.

Questionnaires administered during the study revealed that anticipatory gratitude enhanced feelings of communal self-worth, which contributed to the participant’s resilience, that is, their ability to “bounce back” after the initial failure. In a third study, the researchers found anticipatory gratitude was better than a related positive affect—anticipatory hope—at motivating MTurkers to persevere at (i.e., spend more time on) a different set of challenging puzzles.

At this point, the potential for managerial manipulation should be crystal clear. Indeed, it was evident even to some of the gig workers, who wrote private messages such as, “It may be partial trickery for academic purposes but it was still nice to hear.”

"Gratitude can’t be a substitute for fair pay and decent work conditions...But our findings are clear: anticipatory gratitude works; it is effective.”

For O’Neill, these findings show that gratitude is more complicated than we previously thought. “This paper is one of the very few to show that gratitude isn’t always authentic and prosocial. It can be used strategically, especially for managers,” she says.

Sincerity and strategy are not mutually exclusive. Empathic managers whose feelings of gratitude are so strong that they have to be expressed beforehand could still be taking advantage of the “thanks in advance” phenomenon.

“In all organizations, you need people to stick with difficult or thankless or boring tasks. The challenge, of course, is how to do so ethically. Gratitude can’t be a substitute for fair pay and decent work conditions, for example. But our findings are clear: anticipatory gratitude works; it is effective,” O’Neill says.

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New study finds associations between use of skin care products and exposure to potential developmental toxicants

mthomp7 — Wed, 04 Sep 2024 13:15:40 +0000

New study finds associations between use of skin care products and exposure to potential developmental toxicants mthomp7 Wed, 09/04/2024 - 09:15

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Michael S. Bloom, PhD, MS, FACE

Use of skin care products is associated with exposure to phthalates and phthalate-replacement chemicals in young children, according to the new and first-of-its-kind study at ��AV's College of Public Health.

A new study led by primary investigator Michael S. Bloom, professor in the Department of Global and Community Health at George Mason’s College of Public Health, has found that use of skin care products including lotions, hair oils, hair conditioners, ointments, and sunscreen is associated with higher levels of phthalates in children’s urine. The associations depend in part upon the child’s racial and ethnic identity and their sex as assigned at birth. The study was co-authored by two George Mason Master of Public Health alumni, Juliana Clark and Kelly Garcia.

A new study led by primary investigator Michael S. Bloom has found that use of skin care products including lotions, hair oils, hair conditioners, ointments, and sunscreen is associated with higher levels of phthalates in children’s urine. Photo by Michelle Thompson/College of Public Health

“This is the first study to suggest that different skin care products used by young children may differentially increase exposure to endocrine-disrupting phthalates and phthalate replacements in young children,” said Bloom.

Phthalates and phthalate-replacement compounds are endocrine-disrupting chemicals, meaning they may interfere with the body’s hormones. Exposure to these chemicals in early childhood has been associated with neurodevelopmental, reproductive, and metabolic disease concerns in previous studies. Some of these chemicals are often used as carriers for the active ingredients in skin care products; others may be used in plastic packaging.

The study collected medical data from 630 children between the ages of 4 and 8 from 10 different sites across the United States, including a clinical examination and a urinalysis. The child’s parent or guardian was also asked to complete a survey within 24 hours prior to the child’s examination, which included questions regarding the child’s sociodemographic information (race/ethnic identity, sex assigned at birth, etc.). It also asked parents to list all the skin care products, including lotions, soaps, shampoos, oils, and cosmetics, that were applied to the child’s skin in the 24 hours prior to their examination, with as much specificity as possible regarding the product type and brand or generic name.

“We found associations between recent use of different skin care products and higher concentrations of phthalate and phthalate-replacement compounds,” said Bloom. “There were different relationships between the use of skin care products and the endocrine-disrupting chemicals in children depending on their racial and ethnic identities and their sex assigned at birth. We also found that distinct patterns of using multiple skin care products were predictive of higher concentrations of phthalates and phthalate replacements.”

While Bloom and his team say that further studies are necessary to confirm these findings, the results suggest that children in different racial and ethnic groups may experience different levels of risk for exposure to phthalates. In particular, they found the highest levels of phthalates and phthalate replacements in the urine of non-Hispanic Black participants. The differences may correlate to brand availability and preferences, methods and timing of product application, and/or the frequency of use by children with different racial and ethnic identities.

“The results can inform policies to address the use of endocrine-disrupting chemicals in skin care products that may be used on children and to help advise parents’ decisions about using products to limit their children’s exposure to potential developmental toxicants,” said Bloom.

“Impact of skin care products on phthalates and phthalate replacements in children: the ECHO-FGS” was published online in Environmental Health Perspectives in September 2024. This research was funded by the U.S. National Institute of Health (NIH) Environmental Influences on Child Health Outcomes (ECHO) study.

Additional authors include: Juliana Clark, ��AV; John L. Pearce, Medical University of South Carolina; Pamela L. Ferguson, Medical University of South Carolina; Roger B. Newman, Medical University of South Carolina; James R. Roberts, Medical University of South Carolina; William A. Grobman, The Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center; Anthony C. Sciscione, Christiana Care Health System; Daniel W. Skupski, New York Presbyterian Queens Hospital; Kelly E. Garcia, ��AV; John E. Vena, Medical University of South Carolina; Kelly J. Hunt, Medical University of South Carolina; the ECHO-FGS study group.

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GenAI brings us closer to automating investment expertise

Jennifer Anzaldi — Thu, 22 Aug 2024 18:39:34 +0000

GenAI brings us closer to automating investment expertise Jennifer Anzaldi Thu, 08/22/2024 - 14:39

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Long Chen

Large language models (LLMs) such as ChatGPT and Google Gemini excel at being trained on large data-sets to generate informative responses to prompts. Yi Cao, an assistant professor of accounting at the Donald G. Costello College of Business at ��AV, and Long Chen, associate professor and area chair of accounting at Costello, are actively exploring how individual investors can use LLMs to glean market insights from the dizzying array of available data about companies.

Long Chen and Yi Cao

Their new working paper, co-authored with Jennifer Wu Tucker of the University of Florida and Chi Wan of University of Massachusetts Boston, examines AI’s ability to identify “peer firms,” or product market competitors in an industry.

Cao explains the significance of selecting peers by relating this process to the real-estate market. “The capital market is similar to the real-estate market in that a firm’s value is partially determined by the value of its peers. In the real-estate market, we price a home based on the value of comparable properties in the neighborhood, or the so-called 'comps.' In our paper, we aim to leverage the power of LLMs to identify comps for evaluating firm value.”

This task is at least as difficult as it is essential. It takes much time, skill and effort to gather, aggregate and manage data to select peers. However, the researchers reasoned that LLMs could do a lot of the heavy lifting of data aggregation and analysis for the individual investors, and produce a list of peers comparable in validity to that identified by human experts.

“The advantage is in the capability to utilize all the information potentially out there so that it is at least performing as well as other traditional methods that can help us investors and researchers,” says Cao.

For the study, Chen and Cao employed Bard from Google, now known as “Gemini,” as their LLM of choice because “Bard has a greater ability to utilize its pre-training data, which is arguably larger than ChatGPT’s and with more parameters,” says Cao.

After defining “product market competition” and forming a prompt for Bard, the researchers instructed Bard to limit its knowledge pool to a specific year within the period 1981-2023, in order to avoid “look-ahead bias,” i.e., future information scrambling the results.

“We need to understand that LLMs are actually a very powerful, new tool, unmatched in their efficiency, ability to process vast amounts of information at a low cost, and accessibility to the general public.”

They limited focal firms to large, publicly listed companies as there is less data out there for smaller or private firms. In all, the data-set comprised over 300,000 focal firm-years.

On average, the LLM could generate about seven peer firms for a focal firm, a number that is similar to the SEC recommendations on how firms should disclose their segments.

The researchers then compared the LLM’s performance to the lists generated by three human experts for a set of 40 leading computer software companies. The average overlap was a little over 40 percent, greater than expected.

They also compared the AI-identified peer lists to two alternative systems for identifying peers: the federal government’s Standard Industrial Classification (SIC) codes and Text-based Network Industry Classification (TNIC), which compares firms based on linguistic similarities in their 10-K filings. The LLM’s output overlapped significantly with TNIC’s. Plus, the peers identified by the LLM were generally a better fit than those from SIC and TNIC, as their monthly stock returns hewed closer to the focal firm.

But TNIC outperformed the LLM in identifying peers for mid-sized firms within the sample, indicating that it is not a clear-cut case of universal LLM superiority.

“It’s especially beneficial for individual investors—as all the cost concerns that we’re talking about are especially relevant for them,” Chen adds.

Regarding the future of LLM, Chen states, “There are always costs and benefits associated with using generative AI. It is uncertain whether current systems will soon be obsolete.” When asked about the SEC adopting an AI tool for investors, Chen emphasizes that users need to understand the pros and cons of using AI to make their informed judgments “because AI cannot be held responsible for the information it provides or for how it is utilized.”

Chen concludes, “We need to embrace this new technology, but we must recognize that it is not yet in a perfect state. Competition to improve the technology is fierce. Our findings might just represent the lower bound of the effectiveness of the technology.”

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Satellite imagery could aid in seeking justice for human rights violations in Sudan

Sarah Holland — Wed, 21 Aug 2024 13:26:43 +0000

Satellite imagery could aid in seeking justice for human rights violations in Sudan Sarah Holland Wed, 08/21/2024 - 09:26

On April 15, 2023, intense violence erupted in Sudan’s capital city of Khartoum between the state-run military and a non-state militia group. Over the past 16 months, the conflict has continued to expand in scale. Peace negotiations have collapsed. Civilians have experienced catastrophic humanitarian conditions.

��AV’s Daniel Rothbart has for many years investigated the plight of civilians in war globally. He believes that out of the 59 protracted violent conflicts around the world, the civil war in Sudan is among the most horrific.

“This conflict has had catastrophic humanitarian implications,” explained Rothbart, the Druscilla French Chair in Conflict Analysis and Resolution in the Jimmy and Rosalyn Carter School of Conflict Analysis and Resolution. “There have been an estimated 16,000 fatalities and numerous cities destroyed. Right now, Sudan has the largest number of internally displaced persons in the world at 10.7 million people.”

As peace talks failed and conflict escalated, the Conflict Observatory, managed by the MITRE Corp and funded by the U.S. Department of State’s Bureau of Conflict and Stabilization operations, approached Rothbart and the Carter School to support an investigation into the human rights violations associated with the civil war.

In areas of violent conflict, scholars like Rothbart must find remote methods of data collection. One such method is through Open Source Investigations (OSINT), where publicly and commercially available information, such as satellite imagery, social media posts, and news reports, are collected and analyzed.

Because the Conflict Observatory specifically requested satellite imagery evidence, Rothbart enlisted a team of researchers from the College of Science’s Department of Geography and Geoinformation Science, including department chair Dieter Pfoser, to gather and analyze the images. Through this method, they can show side-by-side images of the large-scale destruction of civilian areas over the course of the conflict, such as markets, neighborhoods, and health care facilities.

Comparison photos of an area of El Fasher, North Darfur, Sudan showcasing the destruction of civilian property as a result of the ongoing civil war, as featured in the Sudan Conflict Observatory Situation Report "Impact on Civilians from Fighting in El Fasher, North Darfur, May 9-27, 2024"

This is a valuable kind of data for understanding the impact and trend of protracted violence, Rothbart said. “It captures the evolution of events over time in a particular region, and the amount of detail these experts are able to gleam from these images has been used to great effect.” As detailed in the report, the experts can distinguish between a building burned and a building bombed: important evidence for building a future case in prosecuting human rights violations.

But satellite imaging only tells part of the story of the destruction and devastation. Other information comes from witness testimonies, which Rothbart and his team gather with the help of the Sudan Human Rights Hub. By combining these two methods of data collection, they can paint a more robust picture of the breadth and depth of violence.

“For example, with both testimonies and open-source intelligence, we have documented that some militant forces have systematically killed civilians, bombed hospitals, and engaged in large-scale gender-based violence, ” Rothbart said.

Through these reports, Rothbart and his team are the primary source of evidence of civilian devastation in the war in Sudan. And while the evidence submitted by the team is under the discretion of the State Department, it could be used to prosecute the perpetrators of the described human rights violations.

The project is also an opportunity for students to gain valuable experience. Current conflict analysis and resolution PhD student Beltina Gjeloshi, and alumnus Mathieu Bere, PhD Conflict Analysis and Resolution ‘22, are both supporting members of Rothbart’s team.

“I’ve learned best practices in open-source investigations, a myriad of new digital tools, and how to capture evidence via different channels, such as satellite images and social media,” said Gjeloshi. “Coupling the training with my human rights and conflict resolution background has allowed me to formulate unique insights and use tools transdisciplinarily.”

“This deliberate violence against civilians requires that the international community takes measures to enforce international humanitarian law, protect civilians, and hold perpetrators accountable. The work that we have been doing in this project contributes to the fulfillment of that moral and legal requirement,” said Bere.

Daniel Rothbart. Photo by Creative Services/Office of University Branding

"On a purely academic and scientific side, we have been using, and hope to contribute to improve, some innovative technological tools, especially OSINT and GIS tools, for remotely monitoring and documenting what is happening in conflict zones, and for conducting real-time conflict research,” said Bere. “For example, we are exploring the possibility of developing an AI model that will facilitate some of the steps of the data-gathering process that may be automated. The project is an interdisciplinary work, which requires collaboration between experts from various disciplines."

Every conflict is unique, but there are repeated patterns in motivations, actions, and strategies. Rothbart hopes that the global peace community can learn from why and how peace talks have been unsuccessful in Sudan to improve their approaches to other protracted conflicts.

“We must be prepared to recognize that under certain conditions human beings can commit horrific acts,” Rothbart explained. “But in every case of protracted violent conflict, we find human beings who show an enormous degree of courageous compassion in the face of horrific violence. And that’s important to keep in mind.”