Equestrianism is currently facing a range of pressing challenges. These challenges, which are largely based on evolving attitudes to ethics and equine wellbeing, have consequences for the sport’s social licence to operate. The factors that may have contributed to the current situation include overarching societal trends, specific aspects of the equestrian sector, and factors rooted in human nature. If equestrianism is to flourish, it is evident that much needs to change, not the least,human behaviour. To this end, using established behaviour change frameworks that have been scientifically validated and are rooted in practice — most notably, Michie et al.’s COM-B model and Behaviour Change Wheel — could be of practical value for developing and implementing equine welfare strategies. This review summarises the theoretical underpinnings of some behaviour change frameworks and provides a practical, step-by-step approach to designing an effective behaviour change intervention. A real-world example is provided through the retrospective analysis of an intervention strategy that aimed to increase the use of learning theory in (educational) veterinary practice. We contend that the incorporation of effective behaviour change interventions into any equine welfare improvement strategy may help to safeguard the future of equestrianism.
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(‘Co’-)Designing for healthy behaviour greatly benefits from integrating insights about individual behaviour and systemic influences. This study reports our experiences in using insights about individual and systemic determinants of behaviour to inform a large co-design project. To do so, we used two design tools that encourage focusing on individual determinants (Behavioural Lenses Approach) and social / systemic aspects of behaviour (Socionas). We performed a qualitative analysis to identify 1) when and how the team applied the design tools, and 2) how the tools supported or obstructed the design process. The results show that both tools had their distinctive uses during the process. Both tools improved the co-design process by deepening the conversations and underpinnings of the prototypes. Using the Behavioural Lenses under the guidance of a behavioural expert proved most beneficial. Furthermore, the Socionas showed the most potential when interacting with stakeholders, i.c. parents and PPTs.
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Dynamic stall phenomena bring risk for negative damping and instability in wind turbine blades. It is crucial to model these phenomena accurately to reduce inaccuracies in predicting design driving (fatigue) loads. Inaccuracies in currentdynamic stall models may be due to the facts that they are not properly designed for high angles of attack, and that they do not 10 specifically describe vortex shedding behaviour. The Snel second order dynamic stall model attempts to explicitly model unsteady vortex shedding. This model could therefore be a valuable addition to DNV GL’s turbine design software Bladed. In this thesis the model has been validated with oscillating airfoil experiments and improvements have been proposed for reducing inaccuracies. The proposed changes led to an overall reduction in error between the model and experimental data. Furthermore the vibration frequency prediction improved significantly. The improved model has been implemented in Bladed and tested 15 against small scale turbine experiments at parked conditions. At high angles of attack the model looks promising for reducing mismatches between predicated and measured (fatigue) loading. Leading to possible lower safety factors for design and more cost efficient designs for future wind turbines.
With increasing penetration rates of driver assistance systems in road vehicles, powerful sensing and processing solutions enable further automation of on-road as well as off-road vehicles. In this maturing environment, SMEs are stepping in and education needs to align with this trend. By the input of student teams, HAN developed a first prototype robot platform to test automated vehicle technology in dynamic road scenarios that include VRUs (Vulnerable Road Users). These robot platforms can make complex manoeuvres while carrying dummies of typical VRUs, such as pedestrians and bicyclists. This is used to test the ability of automated vehicles to detect VRUs in realistic traffic scenarios and exhibit safe behaviour in environments that include VRUs, on public roads as well as in restricted areas. Commercially available VRU-robot platforms are conforming to standards, making them inflexible with respect to VRU-dummy design, and pricewise they are far out of reach for SMEs, education and research. CORDS-VTS aims to create a first, open version of an integrated solution to physically emulate traffic scenarios including VRUs. While analysing desired applications and scenarios, the consortium partners will define prioritized requirements (e.g. robot platform performance, dummy types and behaviour, desired software functionality, etc.). Multiple robots and dummies will be created and practically integrated and demonstrated in a multi-VRU scenario. The aim is to create a flexible, upgradeable solution, published fully in open source: The hardware (robot platform and dummies) will be published as well-documented DIY (do-it-yourself) projects and the accompanying software will be published as open-source projects. With the CORDS-VTS solution, SME companies, researchers and educators can test vehicle automation technology at a reachable price point and with the necessary flexibility, enabling higher innovation rates.
In leaving the more traditional territories of the concert performance for broader societal contexts, professional musicians increasingly devise music in closer collaboration with their audience rather than present it on a stage. Although the interest for such forms of devising co-creative musicking within the (elderly) health care sector is growing, the work can be considered relatively new. In terms of research, multiple studies have sought to understand the impact of such work on musicians and participants, however little is known about what underpins the musicians’ actions in these settings. With this study, I sought to address this gap by investigating professional musicians’ emerging practices when devising co-creative musicking with elderly people. Three broad concepts were used as a theoretical background to the study: Theory of Practice, co-creative musicking, and Praxialism. Firstly, I used Theory of Practice to help understand the nature of emerging practices in a wider context of change in the field of music and habitus of musicians and participants. Theory of Practice enabled me to consider a practice as “a routinized type of behaviour which consists of several elements, interconnected to one another: forms of bodily activities, forms of mental activities, ‘things’ and their use, a background knowledge in the form of understanding, know-how, states of emotion, and motivational knowledge” (Reckwitz, 2002, p. 249). Secondly, I drew the knowledge from co-creative musicking, which is a concept I gathered from two existing concepts: co-creation and musicking. Musicking (Small, 1998), which considers music as something we do (including any mode of engagement with music), provided a holistic and inclusive way of looking at participation in music-making. The co-creation paradigm encompasses a view on enterprise that consists of bringing together parties to jointly create an outcome that is meaningful to all (Prahalad & Ramaswamy, 2004; Ramaswamy & Ozcan, 2014). The concept served as a lens to specify the jointness of the musicking and challenge issues of power in the engagement of participants in the creative-productive process. Thirdly, Praxialism considers musicking as an activity that encompasses “musical doers, musical doing, something done and contexts in which the former take place” (Elliott, 1995). Praxialism sets out a vision on music that goes beyond the musical work and includes the meanings and values of those involved (Silverman, Davis & Elliott, 2014). The concept allowed me to examine the work and emerging relationships as a result of devising co-creative musicking from an ethical perspective. Given the subject’s relative newness and rather unexplored status, I examined existing work empirically through an ethnographic approach (Hammersley & Atkinson, 2007). Four cases were selected where data was gathered through episodic interviewing (Flick, 2009) and participant observation. Elements of a constructivist Grounded Theory (Charmaz, 2014) were used for performing an abductive analysis. The analysis included initial coding, focused coding, the use of sensitizing concepts (Blumer 1969 in Hammersley, 2013) and memoing. I wrote a thick description (Geertz, 1973) for each case portraying the work from my personal experience. The descriptions are included in the dissertation as one separate chapter and foreshadow the exposition of the analysis in a next chapter. In-depth study of the creative-productive processes of the cases showed the involvement of multiple co-creative elements, such as a dialogical interaction between musicians and audience. However, participants’ contributions were often adopted implicitly, through the musicians interpreting behaviour and situations. This created a particular power dynamic and challenges as to what extent the negotiation can be considered co-creative. The implicitness of ‘making use’ of another person’s behaviour with the other not (always) being aware of this also triggered an ethical perspective, especially because some of the cases involved participants that were vulnerable. The imbalance in power made me examine the relationship that emerges between musicians and participants. As a result of a closer contact in the co-creative negotiation, I witnessed a contact of a highly personal, sometimes intimate, nature. I recognized elements of two types of connections. One type could be called ‘humanistic’, as a friendship in which there is reciprocal care and interest for the other. The other could be seen as ‘functional’, which means that the relationship is used as a resource for providing input for the creative musicking process. From this angle, I have compared the relationship with that of a relationship of an artist with a muse. After having examined the co-creative and relational sides of the interaction in the four cases, I tuned in to the musicians’ contribution to these processes and relationships. I discovered that their devising in practice consisted of a continuous double balancing act on two axes: one axis considers the other and oneself as its two ends. Another axis concerns the preparedness and unpredictability at its ends. Situated at the intersection of the two axes are the musicians’ intentionality, which is fed by their intentions, values and ethics. The implicitness of the co-creation, the two-sided relationship, the potential vulnerability of participants, and the musicians’ freedom in navigating and negotiation, together, make the devising of co-creative musicking with elderly people an activity that involves ethical challenges that are centred around a tension between prioritizing doing good for the other, associated with a eudaimonic intention, and prioritizing values of the musical art form, resembling a musicianist intention. The results therefore call for a musicianship that involves acting reflectively from an ethical perspective. Doctoral study by Karolien Dons
The Water Framework Directive imposes challenges regarding the environmental risk of plastic pollution. The quantification, qualification, monitoring, and risk assessment of nanoplastics and small microplastic (<20 µm) is crucial. Environmental nano- and micro-plastics (NMPs) are highly diverse, accounting for this diversity poses a big challenge in developing a comprehensive understanding of NMPs detection, quantification, fate, and risks. Two major issues currently limit progress within this field: (a) validation and broadening the current analytical tools (b) uncertainty with respect to NMPs occurrence and behaviour at small scales (< 20 micron). Tracking NMPs in environmental systems is currently limited to micron size plastics due to the size detection limit of the available analytical techniques. There are currently no methods that can detect nanoplastics in real environmental systems. A major bottleneck is the incompatibility between commercially available NMPs and those generated from plastic fragments degradation in the environment. To track nanoplastics in environmental and biological systems, some research groups synthesized metal-doped nanoplastics, often limited to one polymer type and using high concentrations of surfactants, rendering these synthesized nanoplastics to not be representative of nanoplatics found in real environment. NanoManu proposes using Electrohydrodynamic Atomization to generate metal doped NMPs of different polymers types, sizes, and shapes, which will be representative of the real environmental nanoplastics. The synthesized nanoplastics will be used as model particles in environmental studies. The synthesized nanoplastics will be characterized and tested using different analytical methods, e.g., SEM-EDX, TEX, GCpyrMS, FFF, µFTIR and SP-ICP-MS. NanoManu is a first and critical step towards generating a comprehensive state-of-the-art analytical and environmental knowledge on the environmental fate and risks of nanoplastics. This knowledge impacts current risk assessment tools, efficient interventions to limit emissions and adequate regulations related to NMPs.
