Malachi Rayner-Philipson, Brian Sheil and Pin Zhang
A common design driver for pipe-jacking projects is the jacking force required to advance the tunnel boring machine and pipe string. Empirical methods are popular in industry but…
Abstract
Purpose
A common design driver for pipe-jacking projects is the jacking force required to advance the tunnel boring machine and pipe string. Empirical methods are popular in industry but are well known to lack accuracy, while there is a strong desire to supplement such approaches with robust data-driven techniques, typically small construction datasets present significant challenges.
Design/methodology/approach
To address this challenge, this paper develops a physics-constrained neural network predictive model for pipe-jacking forces. Information used as input into the model includes principal design information and soil type.
Findings
The physics constrained model was found to predict jacking force to a higher accuracy than current industry practice and better discern meaningful patterns in data than a purely data-driven artificial neural network. The results reveal promising performance for this initial dataset such that there is motivation, as a longer-term objective, to train the present approach on a more comprehensive drive database for more reliable and cost effective solutions for new projects.
Originality/value
Novel contributions include (a) a bespoke framework to constrain a neural network using a pipe-jacking mechanistic model which includes stoppage-induced friction increases, (b) built-in model uncertainty for greater confidence in model outputs, (c) new historical drive data for model training and (d) one-hot encoding of soil type as a model input. The model is calibrated and validated against 14 tunnel drives across four different sites with four distinctive ground types.
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This chapter discusses the findings of doctoral research into further education lecturers' and middle managers' perceptions of how Continuing Professional Development (CPD) in the…
Abstract
This chapter discusses the findings of doctoral research into further education lecturers' and middle managers' perceptions of how Continuing Professional Development (CPD) in the sector is planned and implemented. Thematic analysis revealed that mandatory CPD is perceived to: involve conflicting purposes between those planning it and its recipients (deriving from divergent understandings of professionalism and the role of CPD among stakeholders); and be characterised as mostly generic, didactic, and ineffective, leading lecturers to compensate by engaging in additional, separate forms of CPD. This chapter demonstrates the value of practice-based doctoral study in enabling the voices of educators to be positioned at the centre of an exploration of their own professional learning.
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Alessandro Alvarenga, Mehdi Safavi and Gary T. Burke
This paper investigates the intricate process of integrating historically excluded social groups into long-established routines. Drawing on a dialectical perspective, the research…
Abstract
This paper investigates the intricate process of integrating historically excluded social groups into long-established routines. Drawing on a dialectical perspective, the research explores how persistence and change emerge through the interplay of opposing forces, shedding light on the dynamics of integrating new participants while ensuring stability in established routines. The empirical focus is on an Armed Forces’ ground combat training (GCT) course, examining the integration of the first female officers after the formal ban on their participation in close-combat roles was lifted. The findings reveal a nuanced evolution of routine adaptation and truce reformation, characterized by three dialectical cycles: tentative truces, experimental truces, and enactment truces. These cycles involve negotiations between continuity and reformation, accommodation and resistance, and modification and preservation, uncovering a dialectical dance where organizational actors invest intense effort in maintaining the status quo while accommodating ambiguity and settling tensions. The findings extend our understanding of routine dynamics by illuminating the performative aspect of truce-making, highlighting the effortful processes involved in accommodating new participants. This paper establishes a connection between routines and dialectics, providing novel avenues for exploring complex organizational challenges and emphasizing micro-strategies employed by routine participants to address differences in practice. It also contributes to the field of organizational inclusion by offering a dialectical understanding of integration, showcasing the intricate dynamics involved in integrating historically excluded groups into established routines.
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Gordon Leua Nanau, Jeremy Dorovolomo, Billy Fitoó and Patrick Miniti
Solomon Islands plunged into a deadly inter-wantok conflict in 1998 (Nanau, 2011) that continued for 5 years until the Pacific Islands Forum requested the Regional Assistance…
Abstract
Solomon Islands plunged into a deadly inter-wantok conflict in 1998 (Nanau, 2011) that continued for 5 years until the Pacific Islands Forum requested the Regional Assistance Mission to Solomon Islands (RAMSI) to intervene. Thousands were displaced and at least 200 lives lost in this conflict. We call it an inter-wantok tension because it involved wantok groups (language and kinship groups), which has become known in Solomon Islands as ‘the Ethnic Tensions’ or simply as ‘the Tension’. The conflict deeply divided the country along wantok lines while appealing to artificial provincial identities created by the modern nation state. The country is still recuperating from its effects, and in this context, how can Solomon Islands promote unity, equality and peaceful coexistence? This question formed the basis of our research. We investigated sports as a neglected path to genuinely encourage patriotism and social cohesion in the country. We generated primary data with the aid of the Nominal Group Technique (NGT), a consensus building tool. This chapter reports the research findings and suggestions on how sports can be used to help unite the nation and promote national identity. These include short-term measures, medium-term strategies and inclusive approaches to encourage and nurture patriotism and social cohesion in post-conflict Solomon Islands. The research project investigates, firstly, policy statements and implementation in sports development in Solomon Islands. Secondly, it determines the role sports could play in advancing national consciousness in a culturally diverse and fragmented society. Thirdly, it recommends strategies through which sports could be harnessed to promote patriotism, peace-building and unity.
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Tabletop ‘pen and paper’ role-play games (TTRPGs) can function as spaces of creative experimentation with gender identity through shared storytelling. The last decade has seen an…
Abstract
Tabletop ‘pen and paper’ role-play games (TTRPGs) can function as spaces of creative experimentation with gender identity through shared storytelling. The last decade has seen an explosion of Actual Play (AP) shows that broadcast recorded gameplay of TTRPGs to online audiences. Neverafter is the 15th season of well-known AP show Dimension 20 and is a horror-themed re-imagining of classic fairy tales through the rules of Dungeons and Dragons. Four of the six player characters are male, based individually on the fairy tales of Pinocchio, Puss in Boots, the Frog Prince, and a (gender-swapped) Mother Goose, adventuring together in a story-world called ‘The Neverafter’. Not only are these versions of the fairy tale characters shaped by the players' own explorations of identity, but as an AP show, this is also layered with the expectations produced by the show's wide fan base. Their diverse gender explorations and their subversion of fairy tale conventions are enabled by the fluency of the players and audience in freely flowing between the framing perspectives of player and character. This chapter will focus on non-binary player Ally Beardsley's creation and performance of Mother Timothy Goose as a gay, elderly, human man as a particularly meaningful case study. This analysis considers how heroic masculinity is reconceptualised in Neverafter through the horror-themed embodiment of fairy tale men in the context of contemporary gender issues.
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Hai-xi Jiang and Nan-ping Jiang
A more accurate comprehension of data elements and the exploration of new laws governing contemporary data in both theoretical and practical domains…
Abstract
Purpose
A more accurate comprehension of data elements and the exploration of new laws governing contemporary data in both theoretical and practical domains constitute a significant research topic.
Design/methodology/approach
Based on the perspective of evolutionary economics, this paper re-examines economic history and existing literature to study the following: changes in the “connotation of production factors” in economics caused by the evolution of production factors; the economic paradoxes formed by data in the context of social production processes and business models, which traditional theoretical frameworks fail to solve; the disruptive innovation of classical theory of value by multiple theories of value determination and the conflicts between the data market monopoly as well as the resulting distribution of value and the real economic society. The research indicates that contemporary advancements in data have catalyzed transformative innovation within the field of economics.
Findings
The research indicates that contemporary advancements in data have catalyzed disruptive innovation in the field of economics.
Originality/value
This paper, grounded in academic research, identifies four novel issues arising from contemporary data that cannot be adequately addressed within the confines of the classical economic theoretical framework.