Sociology

Background and objectives : Religious/spiritual (R-S) well-being is associated with greater vitality and lower depression scores. In this study, we investigated strategies for coping with disease and the role of religiosity/spirituality with respect to improving subjective well-being. Patients and methods : One hundred and forty-nine patients (107 women), 44 of whom with systemic sclerosis (SSc), 48 with lupus erythematosus (LE), and 57 with stage I or II malignant melanoma (MM) were surveyed using a self-designed questionnaire, which addressed subjective well-being and disease-related circumstances, as well as the Multidimensional Inventory for Religious/Spiritual Well-Being (MI-RSWB). Results : At the time of diagnosis, disease burden is greater in LE patients than in patients with SSc and MM. Only after several years are SSc and LE patients able to accept their disease. Compared with healthy individuals, the overall score of R-S well-being is significantly lower in LE patients. In LE, photosensitivity and joint pain are inversely correlated with the ability to forgive. SSc patients with facial lesions and pulmonary involvement show greater religiosity. MM patients display significantly higher values for transcendental hope. Conclusion : Talks about the disease and psychological support are the most important needs of patients with SSc, LE, and MM. At present, programs aimed at improving R-S coping skills do not seem to play a significant role, but could be an important resource that should be addressed in the future.

ZusammenfassungIn der Vergangenheit haben Studien gezeigt, dass sich Interventionen bei chronisch Kranken und Krebspatient/-innen positiv auf die religiös-spirituelle (r/s) Befindlichkeit und die Krankheitsverarbeitung auswirken können. Es gibt jedoch keine standardisierten Vorgaben für r/s Interventionen. In einer Pilotstudie führten wir bei 10/24 dermatologischen Patient/-innen religiös-spirituelle Interventionen durch, während 7 Patient/-innen einen Fachvortrag mit anschließendem Telefoninterview erhielten. Die Kontrollgruppe (n=7) erhielt keine Intervention. Alle Patient/-innen wurden mittels des Multidimensionalen Inventars zum religiös/spirituellen Befinden (MI-RSB) sowie mit dem SF-36 zur Lebensqualität zweimalig befragt.Die r/s Interventionen fanden einmal pro Woche innerhalb von 2 Monaten insgesamt achtmal statt, dauerten 90 Minuten und wurden von einer christlichen Theologin vorgenommen, die Erfahrung in Exerzitien und spiritueller Begleitung hat. Elemente der Übungen ware...

Although the association between spirituality and parameters of psychological health and disease has been investigated extensively, little evidence is available for its potential role in dermatology. In a single-centre observational prospective study, 149 outpatients (107 women) with systemic sclerosis (SSc; n = 44), lupus erythematosus (LE; n = 48), or early stage malignant melanoma (MM; n = 57) were investigated using the multidimensional inventory for religious/spiritual well-being together with the Brief Symptom Inventory for psychiatric symptoms (BSI-18). SSc patients reported the highest amount of Somatization in comparison with LE and MM patients (p \ 0.05). Furthermore, in line with the previous research, spiritual dimensions, such as Hope for a better future (p \ 0.01) or Hope for a better afterlife (p \ 0.01), proved to be especially negatively predictive for the global amount of psychiatric symptom burden in these dermatological patient groups. Our findings suggest that greater attention should be given to spiritual issues, such as encouraging patients, imbuing them with optimism, and offering interventions that address spiritual well-being.

The article employs the concept of the “Resonance Relationship” to examine the theoretical and practical tensions inherent in the process of artistic creation as it pertains to the practice of film montage. A
re-reading of the film Blow-Up will facilitate an examination of the
interplay between the two conceptual poles of control and uncontrollability as they manifest in artistic practices. The study will be supported by an analysis of various perspectives on interrelated issues, including the “photographic zoom” as described by Walter Benjamin, Walter Murch’s
approach to montage, and the concept of the “aporia of art” as articulated by Theodor W. Adorno in his Aesthetic Theory.

Efficient feedback on energy consumption is regarded as one step towards a more sustainable lifestyle. Sonification is very apt to convey such information continuously in an ambient and effective way. This paper presents a pilot system for sonifying the electric power consumption of an institute’s kitchen. The reverberation of the kitchen is changed depending on the actual consumption and its difference to a weekly baseline. If the actual consumption is low, it is mapped to a plausible kitchen reverberation. If it is high compared to the baseline, the reverberation becomes unnatural. Evaluating the system gave insights on perceptibility and acceptance of auditory augmentation in a semi-home context.

Research Data Management (RDM) promises to make research outputs more transparent, findable, and reproducible. Strategies to streamline data management across disciplines are of key importance. This paper presents results of an institutional survey (N = 258) at a medium-sized Austrian university with a STEM focus, supplemented with interviews (N = 18), to give an overview of the state-of-play of RDM practices across faculties and disciplinary contexts. RDM services are on the rise but remain somewhat behind leading countries like the Netherlands and UK, showing only the beginnings of a culture attuned to RDM. There is considerable variation between faculties and institutes with respect to data amounts, complexity of data sets, data collection and analysis, and data archiving. Data sharing practices within fields tend to be inconsistent. RDM is predominantly regarded as an administrative task, to the detriment of considerations of good research practice. Problems with RDM fall in two categories: Generic problems transcend specific research interests, infrastructures, and departments while discipline-specific problems need a more targeted approach. The paper extends the state-of-the-art on RDM practices by combining in-depth qualitative material with quantified, detailed data about RDM practices and needs. The findings should be of interest to any comparable research institution with a similar agenda.

Clear and findable publishing policies are important for authors to choose appropriate journals for publication. We investigated the clarity of policies of 171 major academic journals across disciplines regarding peer review and preprinting. 31.6% of journals surveyed do not provide information on the type of peer review they use. Information on whether preprints can be posted or not is unclear in 39.2% of journals. 58.5% of journals offer no clear information on whether reviewer identities are revealed to authors. Around 75% of journals have no clear policy on co-reviewing, citation of preprints, and publication of reviewer identities. Information regarding practices of Open Peer Review is even more scarce, with <20% of journals providing clear information. Having found a lack of clear information, we conclude by examining the implications this has for researchers (especially early career) and the spread of open research practices.

This deliverable summarizes work undertaken in task 5.2 "Information seeking behaviours amongst policy-makers in the age of Open Science", aiming to assess the knowledge-base of policy-makers and how this is impacted by Open Science, via a small-scale online survey of European policy-makers, and a country case-study of the situation in Portugal via in-depth interviews. Its findings report scant evidence that Open Science significantly impacts scientific uptake. The study does, however, challenge the general notion of the "evidence-policy gap", especially amongst our interview cohort of Portuguese policy-makers who also identify as academics.

Open Science holds the promise to make scientific endeavours more inclusive, participatory, understandable, accessible, and re-usable for large audiences. However, making processes open will not per se drive wide re-use or participation unless also accompanied by the capacity (in terms of knowledge, skills, financial resources, technological readiness and motivation) to do so. These capacities vary considerably across regions, institutions and demographics. Those advantaged by such factors will remain potentially privileged, putting Open Science’s agenda of inclusivity at risk of propagating conditions of “cumulative advantage”. With this paper, we systematically scope existing research addressing the question: “What evidence and discourse exists in the literature about the ways in which dynamics and structures of inequality could persist or be exacerbated in the transition to Open Science, across disciplines, regions and demographics?” Aiming to synthesise findings, identify gaps i...

The ON-MERRIT project aims to critically interrogate whether Open Science (OS) and Responsible Research and Innovation (RRI) live up to the positive claims of their proponents in a multitude of ways and whether the Matthew effect in academia, or other forms of cumulative advantage and disadvantage, may be present within or even exacerbated by OS and RRI practices. We set this project against the backdrop of the grand societal challenges that are reflected in the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), which imply required collaboration between research scientists, policy-makers, civil society actors and broader publics. Reflecting this context, we focus our work within this project on three relevant domains: agriculture, climate, and health. Of particular interest to ON-MERRIT Task 5.3, on which this deliverable reports, is whether OS does in fact support scientific uptake by policy-makers, and, to the second point, whether the Matthew effect or other forms of cumulative advantage ...

ON-MERRIT (Observing and Negating Matthew Effects in Responsible Research and Innovation Transition) is a new 30 month EC-funded project, starting in October 2019, to study "Matthew effects" of cumulative advantage in Open Science and Responsible Research and Innovation across research, industry and policy making, through a mix of sociological, bibliometric and computational approaches. This poster gives an overview of the project's aims and activities.<br>

We used criteria associated with the Transpose database to evaluate policies in 171 of the most highly-cited journals across disciplines. We found that nearly one third don't clearly state even basic information about the editorial process, such as whether peer review is blinded. These findings represent preliminary results of the Transpose landscape study.

This contribution has originally been conceived as the introduction to my dissertation, to be submitted in February 2022 to the University of Graz (Department of Sociology). In the dissertation, I take up the vast discourse on data sharing to argue that until now, the most influential positions (exemplified in the works of philosopher Sabina Leonelli and information scientists Christine L. Borgman) have construed their subject matter rather narrowly, both in terms of the dominant case studies as well as in focusing on the narrowly stated epistemic goals of the Open Science movement (of ensuring reproducibility, transparency, and data reuse, say). I take issue with both of these claims based on a series of empirical case studies, to show that data sharing is broader than has hitherto been assumed, especially in terms of its aims which have, by and large, been modelled along the lines of enabling unspecified, global data reuse. With this preprint, I explain what this means based on an...

This contribution has originally been conceived as the introduction to my dissertation, to be submitted in February 2022 to the University of Graz (Department of Sociology). In the dissertation, I take up the vast discourse on data sharing to argue that until now, the most influential positions (exemplified in the works of philosopher Sabina Leonelli and information scientists Christine L. Borgman) have construed their subject matter rather narrowly, both in terms of the dominant case studies as well as in focusing on the narrowly stated epistemic goals of the Open Science movement (of ensuring reproducibility, transparency, and data reuse, say). I take issue with both of these claims based on a series of empirical case studies, to show that data sharing is broader than has hitherto been assumed, especially in terms of its aims which have, by and large, been modelled along the lines of enabling unspecified, global data reuse. With this preprint, I explain what this means based on an...

This document reports on the research conducted under Task 6.1 "Investigating institutional structures or reward and recognition in Open Science & RRI". Our work assesses the extent to which Open Science (OS) and Responsible Research and Innovation (RRI) are embedded in promotion processes at research performing institutions and analyses the disparity between what is valued by institutions and what is valued by researchers in the context of promotion processes. The deliverable presents two original research studies contributing to a better understanding of current reward structures, incentives and practices as they are applied across geographical boundaries: The first study provides a systematic analysis of institutional Promotion, Review and Tenure policies (PRT) to determine the extent to which they, at this point in time, embed OS and RRI indicators. This study builds on Task 3.1 in which an initial international dataset of PRT policies was collected and annotated. The ...