Impact of a Brief Workshop on Stages of Change Profiles in Athletes

This report examines the impact of a psychoeducational workshop on athletes’ stages of change for use of mental skills training. Fourteen teams participated in a sport psychology workshop including seven women’s teams (n = 124) and seven men’s teams (n = 96). Teams were assessed on decisional balance (pros and cons) and stages of change variables before and after the workshop. As hypothesized, athletes reported significantly higher pros and contemplation scores after the workshop, with corresponding decreases in cons and precontemplation scores. Moderate effect sizes (.35 - .68) supported a positive impact of the workshop on athletes’ perceptions of mental training, but data were not collected on how long these effects may last. The results also suggest that research should explore more efficient methods for stage assignment for athletes to maximize intervention effectiveness

Assessing the relationship between spectral solar irradiance and stratospheric ozone using Bayesian inference

We investigate the relationship between spectral solar irradiance (SSI) and ozone in the tropical upper stratosphere. We find that solar cycle (SC) changes in ozone can be well approximated by considering the ozone response to SSI changes in a small number individual wavelength bands between 176 and 310 nm, operating independently of each other. Additionally, we find that the ozone varies approximately linearly with changes in the SSI. Using these facts, we present a Bayesian formalism for inferring SC SSI changes and uncertainties from measured SC ozone profiles. Bayesian inference is a powerful, mathematically self-consistent method of considering both the uncertainties of the data and additional external information to provide the best estimate of parameters being estimated. Using this method, we show that, given measurement uncertainties in both ozone and SSI datasets, it is not currently possible to distinguish between observed or modelled SSI datasets using available estimates of ozone change profiles, although this might be possible by the inclusion of other external constraints. Our methodology has the potential, using wider datasets, to provide better understanding of both variations in SSI and the atmospheric response.Comment: 21 pages, 4 figures, Journal of Space Weather and Space Climate (accepted), pdf version is in draft mode of Space Weather and Space Climat

Stages of change profiles of offenders : exploring offenders' motivation to work on their offending problems : a thesis presented in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Clinical Psychology at Massey University, Albany, New Zealand

Research has highlighted the importance of the stages of change (SoC) model (Prochaska, DiClemente, & Norcross, 1992) in assessing offenders’ motivation to work on their offending problems and as a guiding framework for selecting interventions. This thesis investigated the stages of change profiles in a group of general male offenders (N = 481) before and after a Short Motivational Programme (SMP), which is a combination of motivational interviewing and cognitive behavioural material. For the first aim, distinct homogenous stage profiles that reflected the stages of change were generated by subjecting offenders’ responses on the University of Rhode Island Change Assessment Scale (URICA; McConnaughy, DiClemente, Prochaska, & Velicer, 1989; McConnaughy, Prochaska, & Velicer, 1983) to hierarchical agglomerative cluster analysis. At pre-SMP, the Ambivalent, Non-Reflective Action, Precontemplation, Preparticipation and Participation profiles were generated. At post-SMP, the same profiles were generated with the exception of the Non-Reflective Action profile. These stage profiles were consistent with profiles elicited in previous studies, and mapped well onto the SoC model. The majority of offenders were in the precontemplation stage (represented by the Ambivalent, Non-Reflective Action and Precontemplation profiles), whereas a smaller proportion were in the preparation (represented by the Preparticipation profile) and action stages (represented by the Participation profile). For the second aim, stage profiles obtained at pre- and post-SMP were then used to investigate stage movement following the SMP, by constructing a stage-transition matrix. There was evidence for offenders with different stage profiles showing different responses to the SMP, whereby a comparatively larger proportion of offenders with the Non-Reflective Action, Preparticipation and Participation profiles appeared to continue working on their offending problems or progressed to a more highly-motivated stage, compared to offenders with the Ambivalent and Precontemplation profiles. These findings indicated that there is a need for a more flexible approach to motivational interviewing to more effectively facilitate offenders’ motivation to work on their offending problems. Men with the Ambivalent and Precontemplation profiles may require further help to resolve their ambivalence towards changing, before cognitive behavioural content is introduced. For the third aim, stage profiles at pre- and post-SMP, and stage movements were examined as predictors of recidivism in three separate logistic regression analyses, controlling for salient demographic and risk variables. Men with profiles representing the precontemplation stage were less likely to reoffend compared to men with the Preparticipation profile. This study also found that men who remained in the precontemplation stage were less likely to reoffend than those who remained in the preparation and action stages. These results suggested that men with the Preparticipation profile (which represents the preparation stage) may still be experiencing some ambivalence towards changing their behaviour, thus, impacting on their readiness to change their offending behaviour. It also raised the question on whether men with the Participation profile (which represents the action stage) may be more externally motivated to change their behaviour resulting in less lasting change upon the completion of their sentences. These findings contributed to a more in-depth understanding of offenders’ stages of change, and demonstrated that these stages have important clinical implications in guiding assessment of offenders’ motivation to work on their offending problems, and tailoring rehabilitation programmes to increase treatment responsivity and improve outcomes

REGNET: Mining context-specific human transcription networks using composite genomic information

Background: Genome-wide expression profiles reflect the transcriptional networks specific to the given cell context. However, most statistical models try to estimate the average connectivity of the networks from a collection of gene expression data, and are unable to characterize the context-specific transcriptional regulations. We propose an approach for mining context-specific transcription networks from a large collection of gene expression fold-change profiles and composite gene-set information.Results: Using a composite gene-set analysis method, we combine the information of transcription factor binding sites, Gene Ontology or pathway gene sets and gene expression fold-change profiles for a variety of cell conditions. We then collected all the significant patterns and constructed a database of context-specific transcription networks for human (REGNET). As a result, context-specific roles of transcription factors as well as their functional targets are readily explored. To validate the approach, nine predicted targets of E2F1 in HeLa cells were tested using chromatin immunoprecipitation assay. Among them, five (Gadd45b, Dusp6, Mll5, Bmp2 and E2f3) were successfully bound by E2F1. c-JUN and the EMT transcription networks were also validated from literature.Conclusions: REGNET is a useful tool for exploring the ternary relationships among the transcription factors, their functional targets and the corresponding cell conditions. It is able to provide useful clues for novel cell-specific transcriptional regulations. The REGNET database is available at http://mgrc.kribb.re.kr/regnet.open0

Channelized hotelling observers for signal detection in stack-mode reading of volumetric images on medical displays with slow response time

Volumetric medical images are commonly read in stack-browsing mode. However, previous studies suggest that slow temporal response of medical liquid crystal displays may degrade the diagnostic accuracy (lesion detectability) at browsing rates as low as 10 frames per second (fps). Recently, a multi-slice channelized Hotelling observer (msCHO) model was proposed to estimate the detection performance in 3D images. This implementation of the msCHO restricted the analysis to the luminance of a display pixel at the end of the frame time (end-of-frame luminance) while ignoring the luminance transition within the frame time (intra-frame luminance). Such an approach fails to differentiate between, for example, the commonly found case of two displays with different temporal profiles of luminance as long as their end-of-frame luminance levels are the same. In order to overcome this limitation of the msCHO, we propose a new upsampled msCHO (umsCHO) which acts on images obtained using both the intra-frame and the end-of-frame luminance information. The two models are compared on a set of synthesized 3D images for a range of browsing rates (16.67, 25 and 50 fps). Our results demonstrate that, depending on the details of the luminance transition profiles, neglecting the intra-frame luminance information may lead to over- or underestimation of lesion detectability. Therefore, we argue that using the umsCHO rather than msCHO model is more appropriate for estimating the detection performance in the stack-browsing mode

ACT-Enhanced Behavior Therapy in Group Format for Trichotillomania: An Effectiveness Study

Background This study sought to investigate the effectiveness of group treatment for trichotillomania (TTM) in ordinary clinical settings. Treatment consisted of a combination of habit reversal training (HRT) and acceptance and commitment treatment (ACT). Both short- and long-term effects were explored, as well as individual change trajectories. Methods The sample consist of fifty-three patients with TTM. Treatment outcomes were evaluated at post-treatment and at one-year follow-up using self-report questionnaires (Massachusetts General Hospital Hair Pulling Scale, MGH-HS), structured clinical interviews (National Institute of Mental Health Trichotillomania Severity Scale, NIMH-TSS), and the Clinical Global Impression scale for TTM (CGI-TTM). Results Analyses by mixed models for repeated measurements yielded a statistically significant effect of time (p Conclusions ACT-enhanced behavior therapy in a group format seems efficient for reducing symptoms of trichotillomania

Studies of vertical wind profiles at Cape Kennedy, Florida Final report

Vertical wind profiles spectral analysis and numerical wind forecasts at Cape Kenned

An environment for studying the impact of spatialising sonified graphs on data comprehension

We describe AudioCave, an environment for exploring the impact of spatialising sonified graphs on a set of numerical data comprehension tasks. Its design builds on findings regarding the effectiveness of sonified graphs for numerical data overview and discovery by visually impaired and blind students. We demonstrate its use as a test bed for comparing the approach of accessing a single sonified numerical datum at a time to one where multiple sonified numerical data can be accessed concurrently. Results from this experiment show that concurrent access facilitates the tackling of our set multivariate data comprehension tasks. AudioCave also demonstrates how the spatialisation of the sonified graphs provides opportunities for sharing the representation. We present two experiments investigating users solving set data comprehension tasks collaboratively by sharing the data representation