Development of Ambient PM 2.5 Management Strategies

INE/AUTC 11.2

Are Age, Gender and the Interaction of Age and Gender Associated with Older People’s Attitudes to Ageing?

Objective: Negative attitudes to ageing (AtA) are associated with poorer health and well-being outcomes. Gendered ageing experiences may translate into gender differences in AtA. This study aims to explore whether there is a relationship between age, gender, their interaction and AtA. Method: Cross-sectional relationships between age, gender, their intersection and AtA were investigated, using a sample of 260 British people aged 60 – 100 years. AtA were assessed by the Attitudes to Ageing Questionnaire’s (AAQ; Laidlaw et al., 2007) three domains: Psychosocial Loss, Physical Change and Psychological Growth. Results: Hierarchical multiple regressions indicated that greater age was statistically significantly associated with increased psychosocial loss and less favourable attitudes regarding physical changes, but not psychological growth. Gender and gender’s interaction with age were not statistically significantly associated with any of the AAQ domains. Some demographic predictors were statistically significantly associated with domains of the AAQ, with this varying between domains. Conclusions: The ageing experiences of the males and females in the sample were not fully representative of the general population, possibly contributing to the absence of statistically significant relationships between gender, the age by gender interaction and AtA. Specific demographic factors are associated with negative AtA for both genders. However, females may be at a heightened risk of endorsing negative AtA as they may be more likely to experience those demographic factors. The current study could be replicated within multiple, smaller age categories of older people, to determine whether predictors of AtA vary across specific timepoints of later life

The impact of a group-based acceptance and commitment therapy intervention on parents of children diagnosed with an autism spectrum disorder

Parents of children diagnosed with an autism spectrum disorder face significant stressors and challenges; however, little research has investigated ways to effectively address their psychological distress and adjustment issues. This study used a between-subject and withinsubject repeated measures design to test the effects of an 8-week Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) or treatment as usual (TAU) group. Treatment completers included 13 mothers in the ACT condition and 4 mothers in TAU. They were assessed three weeks before the intervention, one week after, and three months post-intervention. Limited data for between-group comparison demonstrated only a significant difference on the frequency scale of the Automatic Thoughts Questionnaire (ATQ), in which frequency of automatic thoughts increased for mothers in the TAU condition. For mothers in the ACT condition only, repeated measures ANOVAs revealed significant decreases from baseline to post-intervention on the Parental Distress Index of the Parental Stress Index-Short Form. Baseline to post-intervention decreases were seen for the GSI of the Brief Symptom Inventory-18 (BSI-18), with some regression to baseline at follow-up but overall reductions maintained. Similar significant findings were also demonstrated with increases in the Positive Aspects of Caregiving and decreases in the ATQ total score and the believability scale. No statistically significant changes were seen on the Depression Index of BSI-18, the Acceptance and Action Questionnaire II, or the Five Facets of Mindfulness Questionnaire. In exploratory analysis, experiential avoidance correlated positively with multiple scales of a selfadministered measure of executive functioning, including a measure of one’s ability to shift attention rapidly. Additionally, mothers who reported significantly greater levels of externalizing problem behaviors also reported significantly higher degrees of parental distress. This research suggests that an ACT-based treatment delivered in group format may be of assistance in helping parents better adjust to the difficulties in raising children with autism

Cross-Layer Techniques for Efficient Medium Access in Wi-Fi Networks

IEEE 802.11 (Wi-Fi) wireless networks share the wireless medium using a Carrier Sense Multiple Access (CSMA) Medium Access Control (MAC) protocol. The MAC protocol is a central determiner of Wi-Fi networks’ efficiency–the fraction of the capacity available in the physical layer that Wi-Fi-equipped hosts can use in practice. The MAC protocol’s design is intended to allow senders to share the wireless medium fairly while still allowing high utilisation. This thesis develops techniques that allow Wi-Fi senders to send more data using fewer medium acquisitions, reducing the overhead of idle periods, and thus improving end-to-end goodput. Our techniques address the problems we identify with Wi-Fi’s status quo. Today’s commodity Linux Wi-Fi/IP software stack and Wi-Fi cards waste medium acquisitions as they fail to queue enough packets that would allow for effective sending of multiple frames per wireless medium acquisition. In addition, for bi-directional protocols such as TCP, TCP data and TCP ACKs contend for the wireless channel, wasting medium acquisitions (and thus capacity). Finally, the probing mechanism used for bit-rate adaptation in Wi-Fi networks increases channel acquisition overhead. We describe the design and implementation of Aggregate Aware Queueing (AAQ), a fair queueing discipline, that coordinates scheduling of frame transmission with the aggregation layer in the Wi-Fi stack, allowing more frames per channel acquisition. Furthermore, we describe Hierarchical Acknowledgments (HACK) and Transmission Control Protocol Acknowledgment Optimisation (TAO), techniques that reduce channel acquisitions for TCP flows, further improving goodput. Finally, we design and implement Aggregate Aware Rate Control (AARC), a bit-rate adaptation algorithm that reduces channel acquisition overheads incurred by the probing mechanism common in today’s commodity Wi-Fi systems. We implement our techniques on real Wi-Fi hardware to demonstrate their practicality, and measure their performance on real testbeds, using off-the-shelf commodity Wi-Fi hardware where possible, and software-defined radio hardware for those techniques that require modification of the Wi-Fi implementation unachievable on commodity hardware. The techniques described in this thesis offer up to 2x aggregate goodput improvement compared to the stock Linux Wi-Fi stack

Anxiety, obsessions, compulsions and depression in postpartum women: effects on parental stress and quality of life

Anxiety disorders and obsessive-compulsive disorder among women in the postpartum period are understudied and their impact upon maternal functioning is poorly understood. There is evidence that individuals with greater levels of psychological flexibility (the ability to persist in valued domains of living despite the presence of negative emotions/thoughts/sensations) and higher levels of social support may moderate the effects of emotional and physical disorders on overall functioning and quality of life (QoL). The aims of the present study were three-fold. First, to assess the incidence of anxiety and obsessive-compulsive (OC) symptoms in a large sample of postpartum women. Second, to examine the impact of anxiety and OC symptoms on parenting stress and quality of life (QoL). Third, to explore whether the relationship between symptoms and parenting stress/QoL was mediated by psychological flexibility and social support. Consistent with expectations, anxiety and OC symptoms were common, particularly in women with a history of mental health problems. Likewise, women with higher levels of anxiety and OC reported higher levels of parental stress and lower quality of life. Preliminary analyses suggest that psychological flexibility, but not social support, mediates the relationship between anxiety/OC symptoms and parenting stress/QoL. These findings underlie the importance of screening postpartum women for symptoms of anxiety and obsessive-compulsive disorder. The findings further suggest that interventions aimed at increasing psychological flexibility may help improve parenting and quality of life in postpartum women with high levels of anxiety and OC symptoms

Determination of the Trainability of Deception Detection Cues

The Air Force and the rest of the Department of Defense rely on valid information to make National Security decisions. The veracity of the information used to make those decisions can dramatically affect which course of action our military will take. Therefore, it is important that our leaders be able to recognize if they are being deceived. This study examines the results of training five categories of deception cues to 190 Air Force Officers. The officers were tested to determine their baseline deception detection abilities, then trained on the deception cues, Arousal, Emotion, Cognitive Effort, Communicator Tactics, and Memory Processes, then retested to determine how much information they retained. The results of this study show that there is a return on the investment in training deception detection for at least four of the deception cues

Preventing Generalized Anxiety Disorder in an At-risk Sample of College Students: A Brief Cognitive-behavioral Approach

Empirical investigations of psychological interventions designed to prevent common mental health conditions have yielded encouraging results. Prior to the current investigation, however, there had been no published studies of a prevention program specifically designed for generalized anxiety disorder (GAD). A twosession prevention workshop for GAD was developed based upon empiricallysupported cognitive-behavioral treatments for GAD. The workshop provided participants with instruction in the following topics: psychological models of anxiety and worry, cognitive distortions, cognitive therapy techniques, relaxation training, worry exposure, problem-solving and problem orientation. The brief preventative intervention was examined in college students determined to be at-risk for developing GAD where at-risk status was defined as engaging in a sub-clinical level of worry as measured by Perm State Worry Questionnaire (PSWQ) scores. It was hypothesized that there would be reductions in levels of self-reported symptoms of worry, depression, state anxiety, GAD, intolerance of uncertainty, and experiential avoidance, in addition to a lower incidence of GAD in participants completing the workshop compared to a no-intervention comparison group. It was further hypothesized that workshop satisfaction would predict outcome. Participants (N=78) were randomly assigned to either a Workshop or no-intervention Control condition and were assessed at baseline, one-month, six-months, and twelve-months postbaseline. Results indicate that Workshop participants demonstrated reductions in all variables of interest through one-month follow-up, with reductions in worry (the main feature of GAD) and intolerance of uncertainty maintained through twelve months post-intervention, relative to Control participants. Due to low base rates of GAD incidence and relatively small sample size, prevention of GAD is difficult to ascertain, although fewer Workshop participants developed clinically-significant GAD symptoms by twelve months post-intervention than did Control participants. While workshop satisfaction did not appear to directly influence participant outcome, participants reported general satisfaction with the intervention. Challenges associated with conducting prevention research are discussed. Overall, results suggest that prevention programs, such as the one used in this study, may be an appropriate format for disseminating preventative interventions for GAD. While the current study is an important contribution to the prevention literature, further research is necessary to explore the utility of implementing secondary prevention for GAD and mental health problems