Repositório RCAAP

Wearable biosensors are becoming popular tools for urban scholars interested in the experience of urban atmospheres. Such devices capture physiological signals such as electrodermal activity, brain activity or heart rate, which can be used to understand individual physical, emotional and cognitive responses to the urban environment. For this reason, biosensors have been praised as tools that allow scholars to reduce the burden on research participants, while obtaining more precise data on the affectivity of urban space. However, ongoing biosensing studies show a different scenario. It has been noted that biosensing data is often ambiguous and thus must be contextualized with qualitative data through interviews or diaries. Despite the acknowledgement of the necessity of mixing biosensing techniques with qualitative methods, there is little exploration of how research participants understand and interpret biosensing data. However, such exploration is crucial to understand how biosensing can contribute toward participatory, inclusive and citizen-centric planning and design processes in the city. With this in mind, this paper presents the results of two biosensing study which have been conducted in Avenida da Igreja, Lisbon (Portugal) and Krakowskie Przedmieście, Warsaw (Poland) in which participants undertook individual walks wearing a Empatica E4 wristband, which measures electrodermal activity. During the walk, participants were encouraged to visualize their real-time data. After the individual walk, an interview with the elicitation of the biosensor data was conducted with each participant. The results of the study are focused on the participants’ interpretation of biosensing data.

Wearable biosensors are becoming popular tools for urban scholars interested in the experience of urban atmospheres. Such devices capture physiological signals such as electrodermal activity, brain activity or heart rate, which can be used to understand individual physical, emotional and cognitive responses to the urban environment. For this reason, biosensors have been praised as tools that allow scholars to reduce the burden on research participants, while obtaining more precise data on the affectivity of urban space. However, ongoing biosensing studies show a different scenario. It has been noted that biosensing data is often ambiguous and thus must be contextualized with qualitative data through interviews or diaries. Despite the acknowledgement of the necessity of mixing biosensing techniques with qualitative methods, there is little exploration of how research participants understand and interpret biosensing data. However, such exploration is crucial to understand how biosensing can contribute toward participatory, inclusive and citizen-centric planning and design processes in the city. With this in mind, this paper presents the results of a biosensing study which has been conducted in Avenida da Igreja, Lisbon (Portugal), in which 20 participants undertook individual walks wearing a Empatica E4 wristband, which measures electrodermal activity. After the individual walk, an interview with the elicitation of the biosensor data was conducted with each participants. The results of the study are focused on the participants interpretation of biosensing data.

Biosensing is becoming a popular method among urban scholars interested in the experience of urban space. Biosensing refers to the capture of physiological signals such as electrodermal activity, brain activity or heart rate through wearable devices. Such signals can be used to understand individual physical, emotional and cognitive responses to the urban environment. It has been widely argued that biosensing allows scholars to reduce the burden on research participants, while obtaining more precise data on the affectivity of urban space. However, biosensing studies show a different scenario. It has been shown that biosensing data is often ambiguous and thus must be contextualized with qualitative data through interviews or diaries. Despite the acknowledgement of the necessity of mixing biosensing techniques with qualitative methods, there is little exploration of how research participants understand and interpret biosensing data. With this in mind, this paper presents the results of a biosensing study which has been conducted in Avenida da Igreja, Lisbon (Portugal) between May and September 2022. In this study, 20 individuals participated in a two-step activity. First, participants undertook individual walks wearing a Empatica E4 wristband, which measures electrodermal activity. Secondly, a post-walk interview in which the biosensing data was elicited was conducted. The results of these study highlight the differing interpretations of biosensing data and the generativity of undertaking in-depth conversations through the elicitation of biosensing data.

Desenvolver e testar metodologias mistas inclusivas e participativas através da utilização de dados de biodeteção (biosensing) que permitam planear espaços de turismo, consumo e lazer mais saudáveis, conviviais e sustentáveis.

O o objetivo deste projeto é desenvolver e testar metodologias mistas inclusivas e participativas que utilizam dados de biossensores para planejar e projetar áreas de turismo, consumo e lazer saudáveis, conviviais e sustentáveis.

The Black and White Travelling Salesman Problem (BWTSP) constitutes a variant of the Travelling Salesman Problem (TSP). Similarly to the TSP, it is formally defined on a directed graph with a set of vertices V , a set of arcs A and each arc has an associated cost. Each vertex from V is coloured as either black or white, thus V can be partitioned into two subsets W and B, the former containing all white nodes in V and the latter containing all the black ones. The objective of the BWTSP is to determine the Hamiltonian circuit with minimal cost in the graph which satisfies two conditions: it must not contain more than Q white nodes between two consecutive black vertices, and the total length between two consecutive black vertices must not exceed a value L. The BWTSP has real-life applications in the design of telecommunication networks and in the scheduling of aircraft operations. In the computational complexity theory, the BWTSP is classified as an NP-hard problem. This motivates the development of heuristic methods in order to obtain feasible solutions with an associated value close to the global optimum within a reasonable amount of computational time. Our goal is to develop heuristics which can be applied on both symmetric and asymmetric instances of the BWTSP, so that these methods can be used to solve more real-life problems. Due to the additional constraints of the BWTSP in comparison to the classical TSP, determining an initial feasible solution for a given instance of the problem is not a simple task, specially when the values of both parameters Q and L are tight. Therefore, we propose three constructive heuristics for the BWTSP in this dissertation. An Iterated Local Search (ILS) algorithm was proposed as an improvement heuristic. In order to justify our choice of parameters for the algorithm, we compared the performance of the ILS considering different combinations of parameters. Furthermore, we studied in more detail the performance of the ILS we proposed and analysed the differences regarding the quality of the final solutions between symmetric and asymmetric instances.

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The objective of this project is to develop and test inclusive and participatory mixed methodologies that use biosensor data to plan and design healthy, convivial, and sustainable tourism, consumption and leisure areas.

Frequently, deep partial and full-thickness skin wounds do not spontaneously regenerate. To restore the normal function of skin, epidermal and dermal components have to be supplied to the wound bed by grafting various substrates. Available options are limited and frequently costly. Herein, authors present a possible approach using 3D skin scaffolds capable of mimicking structure and biological functions of the extracellular matrix, providing, in parallel, a good environment for cell attachment, proliferation and differentiation. Low-molecular weight chitosan-based membranes were prepared by freeze-drying and ionizing radiation techniques to be used as skin scaffolds. Poly (vinyl alcohol), PVA, vinyl pyrrolidone, VP, and gelatin from cold water fish were incorporated. Information regarding membranes’ physical-chemical properties from SEM analysis, swelling and weight loss, together with biological response through in vitro assays (using Human Caucasian Fetal Foreskin Fibroblast) allowed the selection of an optimized batch of membranes that was used as skin scaffold in a dorsal rat model wound. The in vivo implantation assays (in Wistar rats) resulted in very promising results: (i) healing process faster than control; (ii) good vascularization; (iii) viable new tissues morphologically functional.

Ao publicarmos o quarto número da revista “Educação, Formação & Tecnologias” e completando assim o seu segundo ano editorial, lançamos um olhar sobre um evento internacional recentemente realizado em Lisboa, da iniciativa de organizações empresariais portuguesas, sobre a relação entre aprendizagem, criatividade e inovação. Referimo‐nos à conferência “Creative Learning Innovation Marketplace”, realizada no passado mês de Outubro na sequência de uma outra, a “eLearning Lisboa 2007. Delivering on the Lisbon Agenda”. Estando na base da sua organização diversas entidades ligadas ao mundo empresarial, ao mundo da formação profissional e contando também com a colaboração de algumas universidades portuguesas, ambos os eventos tinham como preocupação central a reflexão sobre as questões do conhecimento e da aprendizagem que é estimulada e suportada pelas novas ferramentas tecnológicas que a Internet coloca hoje ao nosso dispor, nomeadamente as que, dada a sua preponderância colaborativa, são já conhecidas por aplicações sociais ("social applications").

Scientists, policy makers and non-governmental organisations, among other actors, increasingly recognize the relevance of conducting research through citizen science (CS). As such, new projects involving this practice continue to emerge. Participants in CS projects can be engaged in various steps, which can range from contributions in designing the projects and defining/prioritising hypotheses, collecting, and analysing data, to communicating the results. However, as with other research practices, CS faces several challenges and questions that need to be addressed such as the recruitment of participants and their retention. Since retention of participation is central to the success of projects and their overall impact, a better understanding of the specific actions that increase such retention could benefit the citizen science community. The NEWSERA project (https://newsera2020.eu/), is analysing how to improve engagement of each stakeholder from the quadruple-helix model (citizens, academics, policy makers and industry) in CS through the implementation of co-created innovative science communication strategies. So, in a dialogue roundtable that took place at Engaging Citizen Science Conference 2022 (Aarhus, Denmark), the NEWSERA team developed a methodology to discuss with CS project managers, participants, and other stakeholders, the challenges faced in maintaining long-term engagement, specifically focusing on citizens as the main stakeholder target group. The discussions and results that resulted from this session contribute to the debate around the best strategies to engage and keep participants in CS projects and provide some clues for CS project managers to improve their engagement strategies.

Marco Teórico - Representação e o Não-representacional - Subjetividades, Afetos (Affect) e Sensações - Materialismo Relacional - Movimento, Tempo e Eventos - Pensamento em Ação (Thinking-in-action) - Métodos Atmosféricos - Métodos Móveis - Big data / Thick data

Corruption scandals and their investigation have been shown to undermine support not only for the allegedly involved public officials but also for political actors and institutions more generally. However, we know little about what happens when those investigations end up failing to result in punishments. Is citizens' trust in the legal authorities in charge of prosecuting and punishing corruption also undermined? Do those effects spill over to political actors, institutions, and even the political regime? We address these questions by taking advantage of an April 2021 judicial decision to drop corruption charges against former Portuguese Prime Minister José Sócrates during the fieldwork of a public opinion survey. We show that the decision had a substantial negative impact on public trust in the courts. Furthermore, although political trust was not immediately affected, its overall levels also became lower in comparison to periods before the judicial decision, suggesting a spillover effect.

Throughout the last decades, southern Africa has become increasingly vulnerable to weather variability, which affects moisture advection and convergence in the lower levels of the atmosphere and impact local rainfall, essential for rudimentary rainfed agricultural systems, in which most of countries’ economies rely on. Thus, understanding atmospheric circulation dynamics is crucial, as well as the identification of humidity sources and advection mechanisms that control precipitation across the region. Using ERA5 reanalysis (1980-2020) and 10 weather stations’ data (2014-2020), synoptical and climatological analysis over the region were performed, namely regarding atmospheric moisture circulation and geopotential height and rainfall anomalies. Recent literature identifies the Angola Low (AL) and the Mozambique Channel Trough (MCT) as two main summertime low-pressure systems responsible for converting humidity into rainfall. The Zambezi and Limpopo river-valley’ associated low-level jets (ZRV LLJ and LRV LLJ) have been identified as major gateways transporting Indian Ocean moisture into central and SW Africa. Both LLJs are controlled by MCT and AL intensities, often conjugated within the same phase (both weak or both strong). Results showed these conjugations of MCT and AL intensities had a higher control on ZRV LLJ than on LRV LLJ, with weaker (stronger) MCT and AL being associated with a stronger (weaker) ZRV LLJ, thus promoting increases (decreases) of rainfalls over SW Africa. At a larger scale, it was shown that El-Niño (La-Niña) phases of ENSO were linked with northward (southward) shifts of the AL system and with decreases (increases) of precipitations across the subcontinent, regardless of SIOD (Subtropical Indian Ocean Dipole) phase. SW Africa region lies in a border-zone of weak and non-significant rainfall anomalies. An analysis of two exceptional rainy seasons showed that during the analysed events, large-scale variability and unusual circulation features could have overlapped its influence over both the AL and MCT systems.

The vineyards of the Santa Maria Island, Azores, have for centuries been planted in terraces divided into plots (corrals - currais) and sustained by dry stone walls. These vineyards are mostly located at the cliffs of the bays. The cultivation dates back to the settlement and the techniques used are similar to other Azorean islands. The plots have been partly abandoned causing the ruining of the walls and the growing of weeds. In 2018, a project for the recovery gathered the Regional and Local Government, the University of Azores and a company. Acknowledging the value of these cultural landscapes as patrimony, the main aim is the recovery for its traditional use: wine production. Involvement of the stakeholders is a pre-condition for recovering a cultural landscape the coastal environment of a small island. The goal of this study is therefore to collect broad views on the purpose(s) of the recovery process: s guidelines of the policies and programs. Trends on viticulture and wine production after-Phylloxera times were identified in the literature on local and regional history. The objective of these preliminary results is to improve further research3.The contents of the meetings and the literature showed a comprehensive approach on the difficulties and possibilities of the recovery of these landscapes. The information points out ways which go beyond the existing policies and activities. The wine production along with the granting of a formal status of patrimony is the key feature. Nevertheless for achieving resilience the recovery actions can be better aligned with the views of the stakeholders and the historical process. It seems worth to take into consideration the feasibility of other uses for the plots: some already into practice (e.g. traditional grapes that do not fulfill commercial requirements) and some new (e.g. vineyards as part of the walking trails). Any actions taken should respect a cultural landscape located on a coastal environment.

Existem diversas variáveis que influenciam a experiência de viagem, e consequentemente a escolha modal. A presente investigação pretende estudar de forma integrada estas variáveis, e explorar o papel de duas novas variáveis – identidade local e perceção de risco durante pandemia COVID-19 – através de dois estudos exploratórios em formato online. O primeiro estudo permitiu testar hipóteses, proceder a análises comparativas entre diferentes grupos, e avaliar as propriedades psicométricas dos instrumentos (internacionais e desenvolvidos) através da amostra total de 185 participantes obtida através das redes sociais, bairros, e da faculdade. No segundo estudo de campo, foram feitas análises comparativas entre 53 participantes de dois bairros com perfil urbanístico e nível socioeconómico distintos. O primeiro estudo sugeriu que a perceção de risco estava associada a variáveis que avaliam o stress sentido nas viagens, menor perceção de controlo, atitudes mais negativas face aos transportes e maior utilização de estratégias de coping nos transportes públicos. Paralelamente, a utilização destas estratégias estava associada ao aumento da satisfação com a vida. Verificaram-se também associações negativas entre o bem-estar subjetivo e stressores das viagens (e.g., crowding). De forma inédita, demonstrou-se que a identidade local estava associada à satisfação com a viagem. O segundo estudo evidenciou que existiram diferenças entre os dois bairros ao nível da identidade local, perceção de risco, estratégias de coping utilizadas nos transportes públicos, impedância e atitudes face aos transportes. Os resultados da presente investigação apresentam implicações na compreensão da experiência e escolha modal em contexto pandémico e do seu impacto no bem-estar subjetivo.

The ubiquitous sharing of information via the Internet has shifted much of society’s communication and information-seeking to digital spaces, such as news websites and social networks. As the Web represents a massive hub of information dissemination and discussion, it has also made possible the extraction of great amounts of highly detailed data to answer complex questions on human behaviour and preferences. This shift towards online life was exaggerated during the earlier phases of the COVID-19 pandemic, when many countries were in lockdown and in-person contact was severely limited. Therefore, in addition to the ongoing political, economic, and public health crisis, there were, on the one hand, new opportunities to study human behaviour thought digital data, including support for public health measures or trust in science, while, on the other hand, the deluge of new data and the fast-changing nature of the pandemic created new challenges to data science research, particularly the need to build quality pipelines for data extraction, collection, and future analysis. In this thesis, we focus on the important issue of salience of science and scientists during a health crisis and ask how to build a pipeline to select, store, extract and analyse longitudinal digital media data, that might allow for long-term study of media effects on salience. Therefore, this project has two main components: first, we showcase a data pipeline that makes use of media and social media data, available online, to build a media corpus of news and tweets with millions of documents, spanning billions of tokens, corresponding to more than two years of coverage and multiple media sources and topics; second, we show how this corpus can be leveraged to study the problem of salience, and use the visibility of science during the earlier phases of the COVID-19 pandemic as a case-study, comparing between salience in traditional versus social media. Overall, we present both a transparent and scaleable pipeline and a specific application of this approach, to tackle the question of how science visibility changed during this massive crisis. We use different media types and sources to potentiate text mining and other analytical purposes, offering a digital data-centric computational methodology to investigate questions in the social sciences.

A integração das tecnologias digitais no processo de formação de professores pode ser realizada de diferentes formas e em diferentes contextos. Para além de ser sempre vista como uma integração benéfica, esta pode ter também várias dificuldades e constrangimentos, importando, para isso, conhecer qual a perspetiva dos próprios professores. Neste sentido, o presente trabalho de investigação, inserido no âmbito do Mestrado em Educação e Formação, na área de especialidade E-Learning e Formação a Distância do Instituto de Educação da Universidade de Lisboa, visa analisar os desafios e oportunidades de integrar as tecnologias digitais no currículo na perspetiva de um grupo de professores que participaram no projeto “Aprender Digital”. Recorrendo a uma metodologia qualitativa foram entrevistados alguns professores de escolas do 1.º ciclo do concelho da Amadora que estiveram integrados neste mesmo projeto, com o objetivo de perceber a sua perspetiva em relação à integração das tecnologias no currículo e o seu impacto no desenvolvimento profissional dos professores. Os professores inseridos neste projeto reconheceram e valorizaram o uso das tecnologias digitais na escola e nas suas aulas, entendendo a sua relevância e utilidade. Do ponto de vista da aprendizagem, foi verificado que, através do uso destas tecnologias, é possível dar aos alunos um papel mais ativo na construção do seu conhecimento, sendo que estes recursos fazem com que o processo de aprendizagem seja mais atrativo. Foi verificado que os participantes desenvolveram uma compreensão destas tecnologias, assim como uma alteração de práticas de ensino e perspetivas. A participação de professores com opiniões favoráveis em relação à utilização educativa das TIC (Tecnologias da informação e comunicação) foi valorizada. Estes resultados apontam para uma maior integração das tecnologias na sala de aula e indicam que recursos tecnológicos de ensino devem ser tão valorizados como os tradicionais.

A água disponível para consumo humano é apenas uma pequena parte da água existente no nosso planeta. Dentro das águas disponíveis para nosso consumo, as águas subterrâneas constituem as maiores reservas disponíveis em comparação com as reservas de águas superficiais. O aumento da pressão sobre os recursos hídricos devido às alterações climáticas e ao aumento das atividades antrópicas tem tornado cada vez mais importante a exploração e gestão sustentáveis dos recursos hídricos, em particular dos recursos hídricos subterrâneos. Os métodos geofísicos têm vindo a ganhar importância na avaliação das quantidades e qualidades das águas subterrâneas ao longo dos últimos anos, ajudando na definição de modelos conceptuais de aquíferos e sistemas aquíferos, bem como na definição dos melhores locais para a prospeção e captação destas águas subterrâneas. No âmbito deste estágio foram utilizados os métodos geofísicos sismoelétrico e do campo elétrico natural na prospeção de água subterrânea e na determinação de locais para a execução de captações de água subterrânea em diversos contextos geológicos e hidrogeológicos, com o objetivo de determinar a aplicabilidade e a eficácia destes métodos geofísicos quando comparados com os conhecimentos hidrogeológicos existentes. Estes métodos geofísicos foram aplicados em três contextos geológicos e hidrogeológicos distintos, e os resultados obtidos foram depois comparados com a informação existente sobre cada área para sua validação. Os resultados obtidos permitiram determinar locais para a realização de sondagens de pesquisa de água, bem como identificar as limitações que cada método tem. A comparação destes resultados com a informação hidrogeológica existente possibilitou a validação de alguns deles, em particular resultados obtidos pelo método do campo elétrico natural, enquanto outros resultados deixaram algumas dúvidas quanto à sua validade, como aconteceu com alguns do método sismoelétrico.

Facial attractiveness pertains a crucial role in social interaction, with attractive people being, generally, preferred and highly perceived comparatively to unattractive individuals. Contradicting the maxim beauty is in the eyes of the beholder, literature has enlightened an apparent crosscultural and cross-ethnicity agreement regarding attractiveness, suggesting a possible inherited universal beauty standard. Even though the exact features affecting attractiveness remain in debate, race and information shortage appear to have an influence, with White individuals perceived as more attractive than Black individuals, and Incomplete faces having higher attractiveness. In this thesis, the main goal was to further investigate the role of both variables. Therefore, we conducted a study in which people were divided in two conditions, Original (complete faces) and Mosaic (faces missing 1/3 of the information), and had to rate the attractiveness of White and Black faces of both genders. Our results replicated previous findings, with participants preferring White faces and Incomplete faces. Besides cultural and historical influences on racial bias, we propose a prototypicality account as the underlying mechanism for our results, suggesting that a more developed facial prototype leads to a higher attractiveness of White faces, and the holistic representation of incomplete faces using a facial prototype, more attractive than the original face, as the reason of the shortage information preference. We also found an unexpected gender effect, with women perceived as more attractive than men, that needs further study. Limitations and ideas for future studies are also disclosed.