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Ensuring Access to Safe and Nutritious Food for All Through the Transformation of Food Systems
The developing maternal-infant relationship: a qualitative longitudinal study
Aim
The study aimed to explore maternal perceptions and the use of knowledge relating to their infant’s mental health over time using qualitative longitudinal research.
Background
There has been a growing interest in infant mental health over recent years. Much of this interest is directed through the lens of infant determinism, through knowledge regarding neurological development resulting in biological determinism. Research and policy in this field are directed toward individual parenting behaviours, usually focused on the mother. Despite this, there is little attention given to maternal perspectives of infant mental health, indicating that a more innovative approach to methodology is required.
Methods
This study took a qualitative longitudinal approach, and interviews were undertaken with seven mothers from the third trimester of pregnancy and then throughout the first year of the infant’s life. Interviews were conducted at 34 weeks of pregnancy, and then when the infant was 6 and 12 weeks, 6, 9, and 12 months, alongside the collection of researcher field notes—a total of 41 interviews. Data were analysed by creating case profiles, memos, and summaries, and then cross-comparison of the emerging narratives. A psycho-socially informed approach was taken to the analysis of data.
Findings
Three interrelated themes emerged from the data: evolving maternal identity, growing a person, and creating a safe space. The theme of evolving maternal identity dominated the other themes of growing a person and creating a safe space in a way that met perceived socio-cultural requirements for mothering and childcare practices. Participants’ personal stories give voice to their perceptions of the developing maternal-infant relationship in the context of their socio-cultural setting, relationships with others, and experiences over time.
Conclusions
This study adds new knowledge by giving mothers a voice to express how the maternal-infant relationship develops over time. The findings demonstrate how the developing maternal-infant relationship grows in response to their mutual needs as the mother works to create and sustain identities for herself and the infant that will fit within their socio-cultural context and individual situations. Additionally, the findings illustrate the importance of temporal considerations, social networks, and intergenerational relationships to this evolving process. Recommendations for practice, policy, and education are made that reflect the unique relationship between mother and infant and the need to conceptualise this using an ecological approach
A Comparative Study on Students’ Learning Expectations of Entrepreneurship Education in the UK and China
Entrepreneurship education has become a critical subject in academic research and educational policy design, occupying a central role in contemporary education globally. However, a review of the literature indicates that research on entrepreneurship
education is still in a relatively early stage. Little is known about how entrepreneurship education learning is affected by the environmental context to date. Therefore, combining the institutional context and focusing on students’ learning expectations as
a novel perspective, the main aim of the thesis is to address the knowledge gap by developing an original conceptual framework to advance understanding of the dynamic learning process of entrepreneurship education through the lens of self-determination theory, thereby providing a basis for advancing understanding of entrepreneurship education.
The author adopted an epistemological positivism philosophy and a deductive approach. This study gathered 247 valid questionnaires from the UK (84) and China (163). It requested students to recall their learning expectations before attending their entrepreneurship courses and to assess their perceptions of learning outcomes after taking the entrepreneurship courses. It was found that entrepreneurship education policy is an antecedent that influences students' learning expectations, which is
represented in the difference in student autonomy. British students in active learning under a voluntary education policy have higher autonomy than Chinese students in passive learning under a compulsory education policy, thus having higher learning
expectations, leading to higher satisfaction. The positive relationship between autonomy and learning expectations is established, which adds a new dimension to self-determination theory. Furthermore, it is also revealed that the change in students’ entrepreneurial intentions before and after their entrepreneurship courses is explained by understanding the process of a business start-up (positive), hands-on business start-up opportunities (positive), students’ actual input (positive) and tutors’ academic qualification (negative).
The thesis makes contributions to both theory and practice. The findings have far reaching implications for different parties, including policymakers, educators, practitioners and researchers. Understanding and shaping students' learning expectations is a critical first step in optimising entrepreneurship education teaching and learning. On the one hand, understanding students' learning expectations of entrepreneurship and entrepreneurship education can help the government with educational interventions and policy reform, as well as improving the quality and delivery of university-based entrepreneurship education. On the other hand, entrepreneurship education can assist students in establishing correct and realistic learning expectations and entrepreneurial conceptions, which will benefit their future entrepreneurial activities and/or employment. An important implication is that this study connects multiple stakeholders by bridging the national-level institutional context, organisational-level university entrepreneurship education, and individual level entrepreneurial learning to promote student autonomy based on an understanding of students' learning expectations. This can help develop graduates with their ability for autonomous learning and autonomous entrepreneurial behaviour.
The results of this study help to remind students that it is them, the learners, their expectations and input that can make the difference between the success or failure of their study. This would not only apply to entrepreneurship education but also to
other fields of study. One key message from this study is that education can be encouraged and supported but cannot be “forced”. Mandatory entrepreneurship education is not a quick fix for the lack of university students’ innovation and
entrepreneurship. More resources must be invested in enhancing the enterprise culture, thus making entrepreneurship education desirable for students
A Case Study Examining Japanese University Students' Digital Literacy and Perceptions of Digital Tools for Academic English learning
Current Japanese youth are constantly connected to the Internet and using digital devices, but predominantly for social media and entertainment. According to literature on the Japanese digital native, tertiary students do not—and cannot—use technology with any reasonable fluency, but the likely reasons are rarely addressed. To fill the gap in the literature, this study, by employing a case study methodology, explores students’ experience with technology for English learning through the introduction of digital tools. First-year Japanese university students in an Academic English Program (AEP) were introduced to a variety of easily available digital tools. The instruction was administered online, and each tool was accompanied by a task directly related to classwork. Both quantitative and qualitative data were collected in the form of a pre-course Computer Literacy Survey, a post-course open-ended Reflection Activity survey, and interviews. The qualitative data was reviewed drawing on the Technology Acceptance Model (TAM) and its educational variants as an analytical framework. Educational, social, and cultural factors were also examined to help identify underlying factors that would influence students’ perceptions. The results suggest that the subjects’ lack of awareness of, and experience with, the use of technology for learning are the fundamental causes of their perceptions of initial difficulty. Based on these findings, this study proposes a possible technology integration model that enhances digital literacy for more effective language learning in the context of Japanese education
Photography and Aesthetics: a critical study on visual and textual narratives in the lifework of Sergio Larraín and its impact in 20th century Europe and Latin America
The main focus of this study is a theoretical exploration of critical approaches applicable to the work of the Chilean photographer Sergio Larraín (1931-2012). It presents analytical tools to contextualise and understand the importance and impact of his work in photographic studies and his portrayal of twentieth-century Latin American and European culture. It inspects in depth a large portion of his photo work, which is still only partially published and mostly reduced to his "active" period as a photojournalist, aside from the personal photographic exploration of his early and late career (C. Mena). This extended material creates a broader scope for understanding his photographs and him as a canonical photographer. This study analyses the photographer's trajectory as discourses of recollection of historical memory in time (Mauad) to trace Larraín's collective memory associated with his visual production. Such analysis helps decode his visual imagery and his projection and impact on the European and Latin American culture. This strategy helps solve a two fold problem: firstly, it generates an interpretive consistency to understand the Chilean's photographic practice; secondly, it explores the power of images as an aesthetic experience in the installation of nationalist ideologies and the creation of imaginaries (B. Anderson 163)
Search for third generation vector-like leptons with the ATLAS detector
The Standard Model of particle physics provides a concise description of the building blocks of our universe in terms of fundamental particles and their interactions. It is an extremely successful theory, providing a plethora of predictions that precisely match experimental observation. In 2012, the Higgs boson was observed at CERN and was the last particle predicted by the Standard Model that had yet-to-be discovered. While this added further credibility to the theory, the Standard Model appears incomplete. Notably, it only accounts for 5% of the energy density of the universe (the rest being ``dark matter'' and ``dark energy''), it cannot resolve the gravitational force with quantum theory, it does not explain the origin of neutrino masses and cannot account for matter/anti-matter asymmetry. The most plausible explanation is that the theory is an approximation and new physics remains.
Vector-like leptons are well-motivated by a number of theories that seek to provide closure on the Standard Model. They are a simple addition to the Standard Model and can help to resolve a number of discrepancies without disturbing precisely measured observables. This thesis presents a search for vector-like leptons that preferentially couple to tau leptons. The search was performed using proton-proton collision data from the Large Hadron Collider collected by the ATLAS experiment from 2015 to 2018 at center-of-mass energy of 13 TeV, corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 139 inverse femtobarns. Final states of various lepton multiplicities were considered to isolate the vector-like lepton signal against Standard Model and instrumental background. The major backgrounds mimicking the signal are from WZ, ZZ, tt+Z production and from mis-identified leptons. A number of boosted decision trees were used to improve rejection power against background where the signal was measured using a binned-likelihood estimator. No excess relative to the Standard Model was observed. Exclusion limits were placed on vector-like leptons in the mass range of 130 to 898 GeV
Microservice Architecture Reconstruction and Visualization Techniques: A Review
Microservice system solutions are driving digital transformation; however,
fundamental tools and system perspectives are missing to better observe,
understand, and manage these systems, their properties, and their dependencies.
Microservices architecture leads towards decentralization, which implies many
advantages to system operation; it, however, brings challenges to their
development. Microservice systems often lack a system-centric perspective that
would help engineers better cope with system evolution and quality assessment.
In this work, we explored microservice-specific architecture reconstruction
based on static analysis. Such reconstruction typically results in system
models to visualize selected system-centric perspectives. Conventional models
involve 2D methods; however, these methods are limited in utility when services
proliferate. We considered various architectural perspectives relevant to
microservices and assessed the relevancy of the traditional method, comparing
it to alternative data visualization using 3D space. As a representative of the
3D method, we considered a 3D graph model presented in augmented reality. To
begin testing the feasibility of deriving such perspectives from microservice
systems, we developed and implemented prototype tools for software architecture
reconstruction and visualization of compared perspectives. Using these
prototypes, we performed a small user study with software practitioners to
highlight the potentials and limitations of these innovative visualizations
used for common practitioner reasoning and tasks
Hunting Wildlife in the Tropics and Subtropics
The hunting of wild animals for their meat has been a crucial activity in the evolution of humans. It continues to be an essential source of food and a generator of income for millions of Indigenous and rural communities worldwide. Conservationists rightly fear that excessive hunting of many animal species will cause their demise, as has already happened throughout the Anthropocene. Many species of large mammals and birds have been decimated or annihilated due to overhunting by humans. If such pressures continue, many other species will meet the same fate. Equally, if the use of wildlife resources is to continue by those who depend on it, sustainable practices must be implemented. These communities need to remain or become custodians of the wildlife resources within their lands, for their own well-being as well as for biodiversity in general. This title is also available via Open Access on Cambridge Core
Capital psicológico y espíritu emprendedor: un camino hacia un mundo más sostenible
[ES] No cabe duda de que el emprendimiento es un fenómeno actual y creciente en todo el
mundo (tanto en países desarrollados como en vías de desarrollo), por lo que ha
despertado el interés de académicos en diversas áreas del conocimiento y la ciencia,
como es la Psicología, como se comprueba en los numerosos estudios publicados en los
últimos años. El hecho de que la Psicología se centre en el estudio del emprendimiento
saca a la luz descubrimientos de especial importancia para el conocimiento del
protagonista del emprendimiento: el emprendedor. Los estudios con enfoque psicológico
ayudan en cierta medida a comprender los principales factores que influyen en la
iniciación, desarrollo y desempeño del individuo en nuevos emprendimientos. La
intención emprendedora es la cualidad que impulsa a un individuo a seguir una carrera
por su cuenta. Por ejemplo, en la literatura psicológica, se ha demostrado que las
intenciones son el mejor predictor de la conducta planificada. De esta forma, la
intencionalidad de la acción (la acción de emprender) también se basa en la psicología
cognitiva, que intenta predecir y explicar el comportamiento humano, a traves de la
influencia de las variables psicológicas.
El emprendimiento es también encarado como un motor de cambio social. Las
sociedades tienen características propias y, por tanto, la historia individual de una
persona y su exposición a determinados problemas sociales, sus actitudes y percepciones
sobre ella pueden influir en sus valores. Esto puede hacerlos más receptivos y conscientes
de los problemas de los demás, lo que puede despertar su interés en crear una actividad
social y producir un cambio social. Así, la intención emprendedora social se considera
un comportamiento psicológico que alienta a un individuo a adquirir conocimientos,
instigar nuevas ideas e implementar los planes necesarios para crear una empresa con
un objetivo social.
La sustentabilidad es un concepto multidimensional que va más allá de la protección
ambiental al desarrollo económico y la equidad social. De esta forma, el emprendimiento
está apareciendo cada vez más asociado a una "vía alternativa" (si no la principal), para
generar una transformación hacia productos y procesos sostenibles. El emprendedor es
también consumidor, por lo que es pertinente mencionar que su toma de decisiones está
influenciada por sus parámetros de consumo (sostenible), introduciendo un nuevo
concepto de producto, manteniendo la ganancia económica, tanto para él como para la
sociedad.
Esta tesis es un compendio de cuatro publicaciones científicas cuyo objetivo general es
determinar el vínculo entre el emprendimiento y el capital psicológico, así como analizar
los aspectos que pueden influenciar la intención emprendedora y sus comportamientos.
La primera publicación, un capítulo de libro, tiene como objetivo principal discutir el
desarrollo de un modelo psicológico integrador sobre las intenciones emprendedoras,
basado en las variables de espiritualidad y resiliencia psicológica. La segunda
publicación, un articulo científico, se centra en establecer un modelo causal de
intenciones emprendedoras y explorarlo por género, basado en las dimensiones de la
Teoría del Comportamiento Planificado, y cómo estas están mediadas por la resiliencia
y el bienestar psicológico de los individuos. A continuación, la tercera publicación se
especifica un modelo de intención social emprendedora y se explora en la Península
Ibérica, como el anterior, en base a las dimensiones de la Teoría del Comportamiento
Planificado y cómo estas están mediadas por la espiritualidad y el optimismo. Por fín, el
último artículo, se centra en la adaptación y validación de una Escala de Consumo
Sostenible en el contexto español.
Los resultados apuntan para valores subyacentes de espiritualidad y resiliencia juegan
un papel importante con respecto a la intención emprendedora. Además, la resiliencia
psicológica es vista como un determinante del comportamiento emprendedor exitoso, lo
que nos permite comprender qué impulsa a las personas a crear su negocio y los procesos
asociados a su desarrollo y mantenimiento. Los resultados de la primera publicación
muestran que un emprendedor espiritual y resiliente tiene la clave para la realización
personal y el desempeño sostenible a lo largo de la vida a niveles extraordinarios. Al
establecer, en la segunda publicación, un modelo causal de intenciones emprendedoras
y explorarlo por género, a partir de las dimensiones de la Teoría del Comportamiento
Planificado, y cómo estas están mediadas por la resiliencia y el bienestar psicológico de
los individuos, los resultados han mostrado que hay un cambio de paradigma en cuanto
al género. Es decir, las mujeres presentaron niveles más altos de intención
emprendedora en comparación con los hombres. Portugal mostró niveles más altos de
intención emprendedora social en comparación con España. En esta tercera publicación
también se pudo concluir que la espiritualidad es un factor diferenciador en cuanto a la
intención emprendedora. Por fin, con respecto a la cuarta publicación, y alineado con la
Agenda 2030, el instrumento validado para el contexto español puede ser utilizado por
la comunidad académica con el fin de evaluar y pediccir sobre las actitudes de consumo
sostenible y, a partir de estas proyecciones, comprender el impacto de los Objetivos de
Desarrollo Sostenible.
En cuanto a las implicaciones de esta Tesis Doctoral, podemos dividirlas en dos niveles:
1) teórico – las relaciones causales creadas entre variables psicológicas (por ejemplo:
resiliencia psicológica, bienestar psicológico, optimismo) contribuyeron a sustentar la
literatura sobre la intención emprendedora. Además, contrariamente a un gran número
de estudios, los resultados revelaron una mayor propensión de las mujeres a iniciar una
actividad empresarial, lo que contribuye a la desmitificación de los estereotipos de
género. Finalmente, la evaluación de un constructo como el comportamiento sustentable
nos permite evaluar cómo las creencias y la motivación pueden ser determinantes en la
adopción de una mentalidad sustentable; y 2) práctico: podemos utilizar los datos
obtenidos para: (a) reforzar la importancia del papel de las universidades y otras
instituciones en la valoración del espíritu empresarial; (b) contribuir a la creación de
programas de formación empresarial centrados en la persona; (c) apoyar la sinergia
entre los gobiernos, la sociedad civil y los empresarios (sociales); (d) permitir que la
estructura y el diseño de los cursos de emprendimiento (social) sean más humanizados
y no centrados en factores económicos, así como contribuir a una mejor idoneidad
profesional, a través de la respectiva selección de participantes; y (e) evaluar y predecir
las actitudes hacia el consumo sostenible. También vale la pena señalar que las
implicaciones antes mencionadas pueden contribuir a transformaciones en tres ejes: 1)
individuo - planificación del estudio centrada en la persona; 2) organizacional -
estrategias de cambio organizacional, educativo y político; y 3) social - nuevas políticas
sociales, de orientación y de formación profesional
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