Analysis of breath alcohol with a multisensor array: instrumental setup, characterization and evaluation

The purpose of this work was to evaluate if it was possible to measure the alcohol concentration in breath by a multisensor array, i.e. an electronic nose. The most important aspects were to clarify technical advantages and disadvantages and if the technique is at all suitable for forensic breath alcohol analysis. Even though the system set-up was far from optimal it is clear that it was possible to quantify breath alcohol with a best-case root mean square error = 16.8 mol ppm ethanol (= 0.037 mg/l). However, the method needs significant development especially of the sensor devices. The sensor array was composed of ten metal oxide silicon field effect transistors (MOSFET) with various catalytic gates and one infrared-based CO2 sensor. The system was evaluated by monitoring the breath ethanol concentration of five test persons after intake of alcohol. Gas chromatography was used in parallel to measure the actual breath alcohol concentration. Different data evaluation techniques applied were projection to latent structure (PLS) and artificial neural networks (ANN).     

The Reform of Skill Formation in Russia: Regional Responses

Abstract

Effective systems of vocational education are crucial to economic and social development. However, the coordination of labour market demand and the supply of skill requires either well-functioning labour market institutions or institutionally embedded strategic partnerships among government, labour and employers. In particular, the transplantation of German-style dual education methods to a different environment poses significant institutional dilemmas. Russia presents a useful case for examining the conditions under which such arrangements can be established. Based on a series of interviews in six Russian regions and a set of case histories, we seek to draw testable hypotheses that can be applied to other settings.     

Leaving Europe: New Crises,Entrenched Inequalities and Alternative Routes of Social Mobility

Abstract

This article addresses conceptual issues around contemporary forms of out-of-Europe migrations of various European publics. In particular, we ask how such moves contribute to both the decentring of Europe in migration debates, and to the ‘de-migranticization' (Dahinden, 2016 Dahinden, J. (2016). A plea for the ‘de-migranticization’ of research on migration and integration 1. Ethnic and Racial Studies, 39(13), 2207–2225. https://doi.org/10.1080/01419870.2015.1124129[Taylor & Francis Online], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]) of the social scientific study of migration. This article also serves as the introduction to this special issue entitled “Leaving Europe: Alternative routes of up/outward mobility” that aims to document ethnographically new forms of European emigration and shed light on an imaginary of Europe which is not conceived as a place of prosperity and success but rather as a locus of disempowerment.     

Where did the first divorced people live in Paris and its suburbs?

ABSTRACT

Following the law of 1884 that re-authorised divorce in France, divorce was more frequent in the large cities before spreading to other urban areas and then to rural ones. Divorce rates were especially high in the Seine département from 1884 to the eve of the First World War. In this region, divorced people lived more frequently in Paris than in the suburbs. More precisely, they resided more often on the Right Bank of the Seine in Paris proper (intra-muros) and, as an extension of this area, in the suburban cities to the west and, to the east, around the Bois de Vincennes. A comparison of the share of divorced men and women to the economic, demographic and cultural characteristics of the 20 Paris arrondissements and 74 suburban municipalities in the Seine département shows that a portion of the spatial distribution can be explained by the occupational structures of the area. Divorced people seldom lived in the most rural areas. This urban/rural divide can be explained by two main factors that can be complementary: the economic possibility to divorce – and here we will add the economic possibility for women to leave live alone after a divorce – and the social and cultural acceptance of divorce.     

Environmental predictability influences the relationship between virtues and antisocial/delinquent behavior

ABSTRACT

Despite the notion that characterizes criminals as lacking virtues or character strengths, evidence shows that people who engage in antisocial and delinquent behavior are not dissimilar in possessing character strengths as compared to the general population. Character strengths may be used to either do ‘good’ or ‘wrong’; so that the question is, what situation does direct this use to either choice? This study hypothesized environmental predictability may influence a person using their character strengths to inhibit antisocial or delinquent behavior. Two samples were examined, one consisting of individuals convicted of a criminal offense, and the other composed of non-convicted participants. Individuals responded to a series of instruments targeting virtues and character strengths, antisocial and delinquent behaviors, and environmental predictability in their environment –inferred from life-history strategy. In both groups, virtues were negatively and significantly associated with antisocial/delinquent behavior. A further test of the moderating and mediating influence of environmental predictability showed that this environmental dimension modified the aforementioned relationship, decreasing the inhibitory influence of virtues on antisociality. This means that, in predictable contexts, possessing (or lacking) character strengths is not important to inhibiting antisocial behaviors; however, in unpredictable environments virtues are useful to prevent antisociality and delinquent behavior.     

Introduction: disability,partnership, and family across time and space

ABSTRACT

Notions of family life and romantic partnership, like notions of disability, have been culturally constructed and socially produced over historical time, and our understandings of these notions are being continually challenged and re-negotiated across time and space. Policies, institutions, and cultural practices across the globe have brought about changes to the construction of the family and to the rights and inclusion of disabled people in private and public life. This special issue brings together a collection of studies from different countries and time periods to explore the interplay between disability, romantic partnerships, and family life across the individual lifetime and between generations. With this interdisciplinary collection, we seek to merge disability research and research on family and partnerships through a life course lens. This offers unique insights and opportunities to interconnect historical and cultural location and changing social institutions with individual and family experiences. This introduction presents the eight studies in the collection and discusses them within a life course frame that views disabled people’s roles as partners, spouses, and members of a family. In so doing, it engages in an analysis of (dis)similarities concerning how family dynamics, romantic relationships, and disability have developed over time and in different spaces.     

The European Union as an opportunity: structures and uses of European soft law in French,Austrian and Irish eHealth policies

Abstract

Does European soft law matter? In order to answer this question, the article investigates the processes through which the European Union (EU) affects domestic politics and policies in the eHealth sector in France, Austria and Ireland. More precisely, it shows how the hardening of EU soft law creates a new rationale for the use of European instruments by domestic actors, thus expanding their strategic opportunities for policy making at the national level. Despite the empirical diversity of the cases, similar patterns of variation in Europeanisation mechanisms emerge over time, and the data show how the varying structure of European soft instruments (i.e. their degrees of ‘hardness’) accounts for these changes. This comparative analysis includes multiple process-tracing cases of eHealth public policy making in France, Austria and Ireland in which Europeanisation processes are at work.