Université de Sherbrooke

About: Université de Sherbrooke is a education organization based out in Sherbrooke, Quebec, Canada. It is known for research contribution in the topics: Population & Receptor. The organization has 14922 authors who have published 28783 publications receiving 792511 citations. The organization is also known as: Universite de Sherbrooke & Sherbrooke University.

A Study of Factors Affecting Consumer Evaluations and Memory of Product Placements in Movies

Abstract: An important issue for a firm wishing to invest in a product placement is deciding how its product or brand is going to be presented within the movie. Accordingly, the objective of this research study is to examine the impact of objective and subjective characteristics of product placements on consumer evaluations and memory. A sample of 103 movie goers viewed and reacted to 18 product placements taken from 11 different movies. After a one-week delay, they were contacted and asked to recall the products and brands they had seen. Based on the results, it appears that the effectiveness of product placement as a communication strategy must be gauged against the specific objectives of decision makers.

Maternal and fetal genetic effects on birth weight and their relevance to cardio-metabolic risk factors

Abstract: Birth weight variation is influenced by fetal and maternal genetic and non-genetic factors, and has been reproducibly associated with future cardio-metabolic health outcomes. In expanded genome-wide association analyses of own birth weight (n = 321,223) and offspring birth weight (n = 230,069 mothers), we identified 190 independent association signals (129 of which are novel). We used structural equation modeling to decompose the contributions of direct fetal and indirect maternal genetic effects, then applied Mendelian randomization to illuminate causal pathways. For example, both indirect maternal and direct fetal genetic effects drive the observational relationship between lower birth weight and higher later blood pressure: maternal blood pressure-raising alleles reduce offspring birth weight, but only direct fetal effects of these alleles, once inherited, increase later offspring blood pressure. Using maternal birth weight-lowering genotypes to proxy for an adverse intrauterine environment provided no evidence that it causally raises offspring blood pressure, indicating that the inverse birth weight-blood pressure association is attributable to genetic effects, and not to intrauterine programming.

Senescence rates are determined by ranking on the fast–slow life‐history continuum

Abstract: Comparative analyses of survival senescence by using life tables have identified generalizations including the observation that mammals senesce faster than similar-sized birds. These generalizations have been challenged because of limitations of life-table approaches and the growing appreciation that senescence is more than an increasing probability of death. Without using life tables, we examine senescence rates in annual individual fitness using 20 individual-based data sets of terrestrial vertebrates with contrasting life histories and body size. We find that senescence is widespread in the wild and equally likely to occur in survival and reproduction. Additionally, mammals senesce faster than birds because they have a faster life history for a given body size. By allowing us to disentangle the effects of two major fitness components our methods allow an assessment of the robustness of the prevalent life-table approach. Focusing on one aspect of life history - survival or recruitment - can provide reliable information on overall senescence.

Community assembly along a soil depth gradient: contrasting patterns of plant trait convergence and divergence in a Mediterranean rangeland

Abstract: Summary 1. Understanding how environmental factors drive plant community assembly remains a major challenge in community ecology. The strength of different assembly processes along environmental gradients, such as environmental filtering and functional niche differentiation, can be quantified by analysing trait distributions in communities. While environmental filtering affects species occurrence among communities, functional divergence or convergence is strongly related to species abundances within communities, which few studies have taken into account. We examine the trait-mediated effect of these two processes along a stress-resource gradient. 2. We measured species abundances and the distributions of eight traits related to vegetative and regenerative phases in plant communities along a gradient of soil depth and resource availability in Mediterranean rangelands. We quantified environmental filtering, defined as a local restriction of trait range, and trait divergence, based on abundance-weighted trait variance, using a two-step approach with specifically designed null models. 3. Communities presented a clear functional response to the soil gradient, as evidenced by strong trends in community-weighted trait means. We detected environmental filtering of different traits at both ends of the gradient, suggesting that, contrary to widespread expectations, trait filtering may not necessarily be the result of abiotic filtering under harsh conditions but could likely also result from biotic interactions in productive habitats. 4. We found marked shifts in trait abundance distributions within communities along the gradient. Vegetative traits (e.g. leaf dry matter content) diverged on shallow soils, reflecting the coexistence of distinct water- and nutrient-use strategies in these constrained habitats and converged with increasing soil resource availability. By contrast, regenerative traits (e.g. seed mass) tended to diverge towards deeper soils, while plant reproductive heights diverged all along the gradient. 5. Synthesis: Our study highlights how the combination of abundance data with traits capturing different functional niches is critical to the detection of complex functional responses of plant communities to environmental gradients. We demonstrate that patterns of trait divergence and filtering are strongly contingent on both trait and environment such that there can be no expectation of a simple trend of increasing or decreasing functional divergence along a gradient of resource availability.