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1. Chapter 80 - Experimental and behavioral economics to inform agri-environmental programs and policies.

   https://doi.org/10.1016/bs.hesagr.2021.10.006  

   Palm-Forster, L. & (October 2021, Handbook of agricultural economics)

   Agricultural and applied economists have begun routinely using behavioral and experimental economics tools to answer important questions about agri-environmental policies and programs. These tools offer valuable insights into decision-making that can advance our economic understanding of human behavior and inform evidence-based policies. However, conducting robust economic experiments on agri-environmental topics presents unique challenges that can make implementation of these studies difficult and limit the applicability of results. This chapter provides a practical guide for researchers regarding best practices for applying experimental and behavioral economics to agri-environmental research focused on producer decision-making. We begin with a brief overview of how insights from behavioral economics have contributed to related literatures over past decades and highlight how economic experiments have been used to answer important research questions in those domains. We describe the types of economic experiments used to answer policy-relevant questions and carefully consider the advantages and limitations of each method in various contexts. We also highlight important trade-offs between control, context, and representativeness to consider when determining the most appropriate type of experiment to conduct. The chapter emphasizes five contemporary issues related to conducting robust experimental economics studies: replicability, statistical power, publication bias, farmer and rural landowner recruitment, and detection of heterogeneous treatment effects. To assist researchers in addressing each issue, we outline best practices and we offer recommendations for researchers, editors, reviewers, and funders. We also discuss research ethics and community engagement. Finally, we present a framework for prioritizing future economics research that can inform agri-environmental programs and policies. 

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2. Workshop on Overcoming Measurement Barriers to Internet Research (WOMBIR 2021) final report

   https://doi.org/10.1145/3477482.3477489  

   Claffy, KC; Clark, David; Heidemann, John; Bustamante, Fabian; Jonker, Mattijs; Schulman, Aaron; Zegura, Ellen (July 2021, ACM SIGCOMM Computer Communication Review)

   In January and April 2021 we held the Workshop on Overcoming Measurement Barriers to Internet Research (WOMBIR) with the goal of understanding challenges in network and security data set collection and sharing. Most workshop attendees provided white papers describing their perspectives, and many participated in short-talks and discussion in two virtual workshops over five days. That discussion produced consensus around several points. First, many aspects of the Internet are characterized by decreasing visibility of important network properties, which is in tension with the Internet's role as critical infrastructure. We discussed three specific research areas that illustrate this tension: security, Internet access; and mobile networking. We discussed visibility challenges at all layers of the networking stack, and the challenge of gathering data and validating inferences. Important data sets require longitudinal (long-term, ongoing) data collection and sharing, support for which is more challenging for Internet research than other fields. We discussed why a combination of technical and policy methods are necessary to safeguard privacy when using or sharing measurement data. Workshop participant proposed several opportunities to accelerate progress, some of which require coordination across government, industry, and academia. 

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3. The principles of tomorrow's university

   https://doi.org/10.12688/f1000research.17425.1  

   Katz, Daniel S.; Allen, Gabrielle; Barba, Lorena A.; Berg, Devin R.; Bik, Holly; Boettiger, Carl; Borgman, Christine L.; Brown, C. Titus; Buck, Stuart; Burd, Randy; et al (January 2018, F1000Research)

   In the 21st Century, research is increasingly data- and computation-driven. Researchers, funders, and the larger community today emphasize the traits of openness and reproducibility. In March 2017, 13 mostly early-career research leaders who are building their careers around these traits came together with ten university leaders (presidents, vice presidents, and vice provosts), representatives from four funding agencies, and eleven organizers and other stakeholders in an NIH- and NSF-funded one-day, invitation-only workshop titled "Imagining Tomorrow's University." Workshop attendees were charged with launching a new dialog around open research – the current status, opportunities for advancement, and challenges that limit sharing. The workshop examined how the internet-enabled research world has changed, and how universities need to change to adapt commensurately, aiming to understand how universities can and should make themselves competitive and attract the best students, staff, and faculty in this new world. During the workshop, the participants re-imagined scholarship, education, and institutions for an open, networked era, to uncover new opportunities for universities to create value and serve society. They expressed the results of these deliberations as a set of 22 principles of tomorrow's university across six areas: credit and attribution, communities, outreach and engagement, education, preservation and reproducibility, and technologies. Activities that follow on from workshop results take one of three forms. First, since the workshop, a number of workshop authors have further developed and published their white papers to make their reflections and recommendations more concrete. These authors are also conducting efforts to implement these ideas, and to make changes in the university system.  Second, we plan to organise a follow-up workshop that focuses on how these principles could be implemented. Third, we believe that the outcomes of this workshop support and are connected with recent theoretical work on the position and future of open knowledge institutions. 

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4. Summary Report: 4th Annual Workshop on Resilient Supply of Critical Minerals, 7-8 August 2024, Missouri University of Science and Technology, Rolla, Missouri, USA

   Locmelis, M; Clark, S; Swain, R (September 2024, Missouri S&T)

   On August 7-8, 2024, the Thomas J. O’Keefe Institute for Sustainable Supply of Strategic Minerals at Missouri University of Science and Technology (Missouri S&T) hosted the fourth annual workshop on ‘Resilient Supply of Critical Minerals’. The workshop was funded by the National Science Foundation (NSF) and was attended by 212 participants. 143 participants attended the workshop in-person in the Havener Center on the Missouri S&T campus in Rolla, Missouri, USA. Another 69 participants attended online via Zoom. Twenty participants (including 12 students and 4 early career researchers) received travel support through the NSF grant to attend the conference in Rolla. Out of the workshop 212 participants, 199 stated their sectors of employment during registration showing that 88 participants were from academia (34 students), 58 from the private sector and 53 from government agencies. The workshop was followed by a post-workshop field trip to US Strategic Minerals (formerly Missouri Cobalt) in southeast Missouri that was attended by 18 workshop participants from academia (n=11; including 4 students) and the private sector (n=7). Four topical sessions were covered during the workshop: A. The Critical Mineral Potential of the USA: Evaluation of existing, and exploration for new resources. B. Critical Minerals Workforce Development: How to grow the US critical minerals workforce. C. Critical Mineral Processing and Recycling: Maximizing critical mineral recovery from existing production streams. D. Critical Mineral Policy and Supply Chain Economics: Reshoring critical mineral production. The topical sessions were composed of two keynote lectures and complemented by oral and poster presentations by the workshop participants, as well as a 30-minute open discussion at the end of each topical session. Breakout sessions that concluded each day discussed: • Can mining lead the new materials future? • Critical minerals research: where to go from here? • Should the Bureau of Mines be restored? Discussions during the workshop highlighted, for example, that: (i) Mining companies need to better address downstream needs and develop company cultures inclusive of younger generations; (ii) Although funding opportunities over the past year’s started to make a difference for critical minerals supply chain resilience, additional funding that is aimed at strengthening academia – private sector partnerships as well as international collaborations is needed to ensure a long-term impact; (iii) The majority of participants would welcome the reestablishment of the Bureau of Mines, although no consensus was reached on its potential responsibilities. This workshop report provides a detailed summary of the workshop demographics and discussions. 

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5. Lessons Learned About Designing and Conducting Studies From HRI Experts

   https://doi.org/10.3389/frobt.2021.772141  

   Fraune, Marlena R.; Leite, Iolanda; Karatas, Nihan; Amirova, Aida; Legeleux, Amélie; Sandygulova, Anara; Neerincx, Anouk; Dilip Tikas, Gaurav; Gunes, Hatice; Mohan, Mayumi; et al (January 2022, Frontiers in Robotics and AI)

   The field of human-robot interaction (HRI) research is multidisciplinary and requires researchers to understand diverse fields including computer science, engineering, informatics, philosophy, psychology, and more disciplines. However, it is hard to be an expert in everything. To help HRI researchers develop methodological skills, especially in areas that are relatively new to them, we conducted a virtual workshop, Workshop Your Study Design (WYSD), at the 2021 International Conference on HRI. In this workshop, we grouped participants with mentors, who are experts in areas like real-world studies, empirical lab studies, questionnaire design, interview, participatory design, and statistics. During and after the workshop, participants discussed their proposed study methods, obtained feedback, and improved their work accordingly. In this paper, we present 1) Workshop attendees’ feedback about the workshop and 2) Lessons that the participants learned during their discussions with mentors. Participants’ responses about the workshop were positive, and future scholars who wish to run such a workshop can consider implementing their suggestions. The main contribution of this paper is the lessons learned section, where the workshop participants contributed to forming this section based on what participants discovered during the workshop. We organize lessons learned into themes of 1) Improving study design for HRI, 2) How to work with participants - especially children -, 3) Making the most of the study and robot’s limitations, and 4) How to collaborate well across fields as they were the areas of the papers submitted to the workshop. These themes include practical tips and guidelines to assist researchers to learn about fields of HRI research with which they have limited experience. We include specific examples, and researchers can adapt the tips and guidelines to their own areas to avoid some common mistakes and pitfalls in their research. 

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