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4. The role of eco-anxiety in reproductive wish during emerging adulthoodAnaja Kos, Vlasta Novak Zabukovec, Vesna Posavčević, 2026, original scientific article Abstract: Aims/Background: Eco-anxiety is one of the most common psy- chological reactions to environmental issues and is associated with both past and anticipated events. Younger generations are parti- cularly conscious of their responsibilities, which, in turn, influence their reproductive wish. Design/Methods: In this study, the connection between the men- tal health construct of eco-anxiety and reproductive wish was examined to better understand the influence of environmental issues during emerging adulthood. Responses were analysed from 324 Slovenian participants aged 18 to 30 years, who completed four online questionnaires: the Hogg Eco-Anxiety Scale, the Hope Scale, the CES-D, and the STAI X-2. Results: The discriminative validity of eco-anxiety was confirmed, and a significant correlation between eco-anxiety and reproductive wish was identified. Specifically, participants with higher levels of eco-anxiety expressed lower desire to have children. This relation- ship was further explored with reference to gender, age, education level, self-assessed financial independence, anxiety, depression, and hope based on denial. Conclusion: The findings contribute to a deeper understanding of how environmental issues exert influence on reproductive decision- making through their impact on mental health. The need to adapt existing interventions and develop new educational programmes is emphasised to support younger generations in navigating the transition to adulthood. These initiatives should aim to enhance knowledge and awareness of the mental health impacts of environ- mental concerns, promote effective coping strategies, and foster resilience. Such efforts could assist in managing eco-anxiety and cultivating a more positive outlook on the future.
Keywords: reproductive wish, reproduction, eco-anxiety, environment, emerging adulthood
Published in RUP: 08.09.2026; Views: 64; Downloads: 2
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5. Recommender systems for good (RS4Good) : survey of use cases and a call to action for research that mattersDietmar Jannach, Alan Said, Marko Tkalčič, Markus Zanker, 2027, review article Abstract: In the area of recommender systems, the vast majority of research efforts is spent on developing increasingly sophisticated recommendation models, also using increasingly more computational resources. Unfortunately, most of these research efforts target a very small set of application domains, mostly e-commerce and media recommendation. Furthermore, many of these models are never evaluated with users, let alone put into practice. The scientific, economic and societal value of much of these efforts by scholars therefore remains largely unclear. To achieve a stronger positive impact resulting from these efforts, we posit that we as a research community should more often address use cases where recommender systems contribute to societal good (RS4Good). In this opinion piece, we first discuss a number of examples where the use of recommender systems for problems of societal concern has been successfully explored in the literature. We then proceed by outlining a paradigmatic shift that is needed to conduct successful RS4Good research, where the key ingredients are interdisciplinary collaborations and longitudinal evaluation approaches with humans in the loop.
Keywords: recommender systems, evaluation, applications
Published in RUP: 08.09.2026; Views: 70; Downloads: 3
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6. Practical protocols for improving safety and sustainability in multidisciplinary research laboratoriesWojciech Pajerski, Flavien Ginioux, Amina Selmanović, Anna Malgorzata Sandak, 2026, original scientific article Abstract: Small and medium-sized multidisciplinary research laboratories often lack specialized systems for chemical safety and sustainability. In many countries, including those with limited or no national regulations for small-scale chemical users, this creates additional challenges for implementing effective safety practices. As a result, chemical inventories are often fragmented and insufficiently managed, increasing safety risks. Additionally, solvents and empty containers are often discarded, despite their potential for recovery and reuse. This article presents a low-cost, user-friendly protocol comprising three complementary components: Shared Chemical Inventory, Solvent Reuse Strategy and Container Repurposing guide designed to improve laboratory safety and sustainability in settings where formal regulations are limited or absent. The protocol was designed for direct accessibility without additional infrastructure or financial investments. Implemented at a medium-sized research institute located in Europe, it achieved an almost 30% reduction in the total chemical waste mass. With its integration in onboarding and simple training modules, the protocol improves safety compliance, reduces cost of virgin solvents, and minimizes chemical waste disposal. Relying on existing laboratory resources demonstrates that principles of responsible chemistry can be effectively applied at the laboratory level without financial investments through voluntary, culturally embraced practices, even in the absence of extensive regulation. Its scalability and adaptability suggest broad relevance for other small- and medium-sized research laboratories, including teaching laboratories and start-ups, contributing to both chemical safety and sustainability goals.
Keywords: laboratory safety, sustainability, chemical inventory, solvent recovery, chemical waste minimization, container reuse, circular laboratory practices, multidisciplinary laboratories
Published in RUP: 08.09.2026; Views: 62; Downloads: 2
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7. Engaging the public in plant science : communication facilitators and barriers of scaling up a citizen science campaignKristiina Gibson, Monika Suškevičs, Baiba Prūse, Marta Barberis, Sara A. O. Cousins, Živa Fišer, Margaux Julien, Marianne Kivastik, Marcin Miroslav Klisz, Attila Lengyel, 2026, original scientific article Abstract: Volunteers have been involved in nature observations for decades through citizen science initiatives, providing large data sets as well as problem identification that allow a more complete understanding of many natural phenomena. Although communication is a core component in citizen science, the key factors that determine its effectiveness in national and transboundary campaigns aimed at broad audiences have remained unclear. Using the pan-European citizen science campaign ‘Looking for Cowslips’ spanning across 31 European countries as an example, we explored the main communication facilitators and barriers campaign organisers face in different European regions when engaging the public in citizen science. To do so, we conducted interviews, questionnaires and discussion groups with the campaign organisers. The results indicate that communication in citizen science initiatives poses a challenge, particularly for researchers, who often do not have sufficient time or means for the necessary engagement and communication efforts. In addition to the ecological characteristics of the focal species in the different regions of Europe, the key aspects that need to be considered for planning effective communication in transboundary citizen science projects include various socio-cultural factors, such as the traditions related to citizen science in different countries as well as local indigenous knowledge. Our study shows that collaboration between academic institutions and environmental non-governmental organisations, but also the contribution by local co-organisers at the national level, is crucial for the effectiveness of international citizen science campaigns. In addition, facilitators and barriers of communication need to be considered in each region separately as even at the European scale, we observed a high variability of environmental and socio-cultural settings. Synthesis. In an era of detrimental consequences of human activities on natural ecosystems, it is vital to include society in observations to determine the impact of environmental change on biodiversity through citizen science approaches. Substantial advances in technological tools have helped to foster these initiatives across vast spatial scales. Nevertheless, it is also crucial to select the right pathways for communication to compete with vast amounts of other information and to reach potential participants in varying socio-cultural contexts of different countries.
Keywords: citizen science, communication, community science, Europe, fragmentation, grasslands, landscape change, Primula veris
Published in RUP: 08.09.2026; Views: 65; Downloads: 2
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8. Police mental health and stress in Slovenia : associations with gender and support-seekingPolonca Borko, Meta Lavrič, Vita Poštuvan, 2026, original scientific article Abstract: This study aimed to investigate the state of mental health and help- seeking behaviour in a sample of Slovenian police officers during the Covid-19 pandemic. Additionally, we examined the variables that influence the likelihood of seeking help within the police, the relationship between measured variables and created a model explaining these relationships. Data were collected from a conve- nience sample of 279 police officers, representing 3.87% of the Slovenian police population. Depression was measured with the Male Depression Risk Scale. We found that 20.43% of police officers had a high or very high occurrence of depressive symptoms, with no significant difference in prevalence between male and female officers. We also found that 21.15% of police officers sought help within the organisation. Our findings highlight the need to inte- grate mental health screening into routine check-ups, establish effective referral systems, and implement stigma-reduction inter- ventions to better support officers.
Keywords: police officers, gender differences, mental health, depression, mental wellbeing, help-seeking
Published in RUP: 08.09.2026; Views: 58; Downloads: 2
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9. UzbekPOS : a multi-domain dataset for Uzbek part-of-speech taggingMaksud Sharipov, Elmurod Kuriyozov, Jernej Vičič, 2026, original scientific article Abstract: In this paper, we introduce UzbekPOS — a part-of-speech (POS) tagged dataset manually annotated for the Uzbek language, designed for natural language processing, artificial intelligence models, and corpus linguistics applications. This tagged corpus is currently the largest publicly available POS- tagged corpus for the Uzbek language. The dataset comprises sentences drawn from a diverse range of Uzbek text sources, including literature, news outlets, science, education, and public speaking, to reflect linguistic and topical diversity. The sentences are tokenized and annotated by professional annotators, utilizing a finely grained POS tagset which integrates standard Universal Dependencies with additional labels that are specific to the morphological and syntactic features of the Uzbek language, comprising 16 tags in total. The UzbekPOS contains almost 4.5K sentences and more than 53K token/tag pairs, with each annotation cross-verified by at least two annotators for highest reliability. It also comes with both raw (txt) and generally accepted formats of distribution (TSV, JSON), as well as the universal POS-tagging format (conllu). This resource is one of the first and the largest openly published POS-tagged dataset for Uzbek, an under-resourced and morphologically complex Turkic language. This dataset can also act as a key foundation for training POS taggers, as a test set for machine learning models, and as a source for linguistic studies. The resource also bears the reusability potential for tasks of related kinds, such as morphological analysis, syntactic parsing, and transfer learning across languages of the Turkic family. Furthermore, this dataset can serve as seed material for creating similar corpora of POS for other Turkic languages and can help conduct cross-linguistic analyses and tool building.
Keywords: POS tagging, Uzbek language, morphological annotation, natural language processing
Published in RUP: 08.09.2026; Views: 65; Downloads: 2
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10. Leveraging machine learning to predict academic success : a literature review and bibliometric trend analysisBor Bregant, Andreja Istenič, 2026, review article Abstract: This study synthesizes research on the use of machine learning (ML) to predict academic success through a three-scope approach. First, a systematic review of 33 review studies from Web of Science (WOS), Scopus, and Taylor & Francis identifies prevailing methods, levels of prediction, and recurrent gaps in the literature. The synthesis of 33 review studies reveals a consolidation around supervised learning approaches and prediction-focused frameworks, with recurring gaps related to real world implementation and pedagogical integration. Second, a qualitative synthesis of the 10 most cited WOS articles provides in-depth insight into influential algorithmic strategies, data sources, and emerging emphases on explainability, human-centered modeling, and early intervention. Third, a bibliometric analysis of 520 WOS articles maps publication trends, country-level productivity, keyword co-occurrence, citation patterns, and international collaboration networks. Results indicate growing publication activity between 2018 and 2025, with research thematically clustering around methodological foundations in educational data mining, model development and prediction strategies, and contextual applications primarily in higher education, with limited chronological differentiation across themes. China leads in publication volume, while major collaboration hubs are concentrated in Australia, India, and Saudi Arabia. Persistent challenges include inconsistent terminology, data heterogeneity, and limited real-world deployment of ML models.
Keywords: data mining, machine learning, academic success, education, systematic literature review, bibliometric analysis
Published in RUP: 08.09.2026; Views: 40; Downloads: 1
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