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This book demonstrates how delay differential equations (DDEs) can be used to compliment the laboratory investigation of human balancing tasks. This approach is made accessible to non-specialists by comparing mathematical predictions and experimental observations. For example, the observation that a longer pole is easier to balance on a fingertip than a shorter one demonstrates the essential role played by a time delay in the balance control mechanism. Another balancing task considered is postural sway during quiet standing. With the inverted pendulum as the driver and the feedback control depending on state variables or on an internal model, the feedback can be identified by determining a critical pendulum length and/or a critical delay. This approach is used to identify the nature of the feedback for the pole balancing and postural sway examples. Motivated by the question of how the nervous system deals with these feedback control challenges, there is a discussion of ‘’microchaotic’’ fluctuations in balance control and how robust control can be achieved in the face of uncertainties in the estimation of control parameters. The final chapter suggests some topics for future research. Each chapter includes an abstract and a point-by-point summary of the main concepts that have been established. A particularly useful numerical integration method for the DDEs that arise in balance control is semi-discretization. This method is described and a MATLAB template is provided. This book will be a useful source for anyone studying balance in humans, other bipedal organisms and humanoid robots. Much of the material has been used by the authors to teach senior undergraduates in computational neuroscience and students in bio-systems, biomedical, mechanical and neural engineering.
This volume is the most recent installment of the Progress in Motor Control series. It contains contributions based on presentations by invited speakers at the Progress in Motor Control VIII meeting held in Cincinnati, OH, USA in July, 2011. Progress in Motor Control is the official scientific meeting of the International Society of Motor Control (ISMC). The Progress in Motor Control VIII meeting, and consequently this volume, provide a broad perspective on the latest research on motor control in humans and other species.
Over the decades, academic literature has too often neglected the complexities and diversity of the African continent and the challenges faced by both multinational companies working across Africa and domestic African companies, particularly in the field of human resources. This edited collection has been compiled with the aim of developing our understanding and practice of HRM in an African context within an increasingly global work milieu. Chapters focus on different African countries and are underpinned by a critical approach to HRM, which goes beyond focussing on the business cases but considers the sensitivity of the national context. The authors will draw on various types of research (conceptual, theoretical and empirical) and incorporate contextual issues such as technology, politics, culture, and economics to supplement the readers’ insights into the current state of human resource management in African countries. By highlighting theoretical underpinnings and emphasising the practical relevance of HR issues, this proposed book will offer an insightful guide for students and scholars interested in HR and management in developing economies.
This volume addresses the relationship between childbearing, paid work and work-life balance policies across Europe in the 21st century, illuminating the uncertainty and risk related to insecure labour force attachment, the incoherence of women's and men's access to education and employment and the unequal share of domestic responsibilities.
This eBook is a collection of articles from a Frontiers Research Topic. Frontiers Research Topics are very popular trademarks of the Frontiers Journals Series: they are collections of at least ten articles, all centered on a particular subject. With their unique mix of varied contributions from Original Research to Review Articles, Frontiers Research Topics unify the most influential researchers, the latest key findings and historical advances in a hot research area! Find out more on how to host your own Frontiers Research Topic or contribute to one as an author by contacting the Frontiers Editorial Office: frontiersin.org/about/contact.
The perception of time is crucial for everyday activities from the sleep–wake cycle to playing and appreciating music, verbal communication, to the determination of the value of a particular behavior. With regard to the last point, making decisions is heavily influenced by the duration of the various options, the duration of the expected delays for receiving the options, and the time constraints for making a choice. Recent advances suggest that the brain represents time in a distributed manner and reflects time as a result of temporal changes in network states and/or by the coincidence detection of the phase of different neural populations. Moreover, intrinsic oscillatory properties of neural circuits could determine timed motor responses. This Research Topic, partly an emergence of a Satellite EBBS meeting sponsored by the COST-Action TIMELY, will discuss how time in the physical world is reconstructed, distorted and modified in brain networks by emotion, learning and neuropathology. This Research Topic on Timing contains up-to-date reviews regarding the relationship between time and decision-making with respect to the underlying psychological and physiological mechanisms responsible for anticipation and evaluation processes.
Critical Issues in Human Resource Management will enable all HR students to take a critical approach to HR issues. Outlining the influences and shapers of HR strategy including ethics, managing in different national contexts, employment relations, politics, governance and finance, this book provides students with a full understanding of the complexities of HRM strategy and what the implications of these are. There is also crucial discussion of critical issues in the processes and practice of HRM including the dilemmas of onshoring and offshoring, gender equality, challenging institutional racism and disability discrimination in the modern workplace to enable readers to think deeply and critically about these issues. Critical Issues in Human Resource Management also includes discussion of the application of HRM in different sectors such as manufacturing, the public sector, the private sector and not-for-profit organizations. This will enable HR students to examine HR practices in specific industries and to think about how issues might be dealt with differently in different sectors, rather than assuming that best practice is universal. Online resources include a lecturer guide with additional seminar activities and discussion topics, powerpoint slides and annotated weblinks for students to enable them to develop an astute, nuanced and critical approach to human resource management
This book addresses some issues related to depression. In particular, the edited chapters examine aspects related to culture and trauma as pathoplastic elements, innovative treatment aspects such as acupuncture or animal-assisted treatment, correlations between depression, and some somatic aspects. The volume is useful in renewing interest in a pathology that represents one of the most widespread mental illnesses that is also one of the least treated according to scientific evidence.
This book reflects the enormous interest in work-life balance and current pressing concerns about the impacts of austerity more broadly. It draws on contemporary research and practitioner experiences to explore how work-life balance and related workplace and social policy fare in turbulent economic times and the implications for employees, employers and wider societies. Authors consider workplace trends, practices and employment relations and the impacts on work, care and well-being of diverse workers. A guiding theme throughout the book is a triple agenda of supporting employee work-life balance, workplace effectiveness and social justice. The final chapters present case studies of innovative processes and organizational practices for addressing the triple agenda, note the important role of social policy context and discuss the challenge of extending debates on work-life balance to include a social justice dimension. This book will be of interest to academics and postgraduate students of organisational psychology, sociology, human resource management, management and business studies, law and social policy, as well as employers, managers, HR managers, trade unions, and policy makers.