Valuing Carers 2021:England and Wales

This research, undertaken by Centre for Care colleagues Maria Petrillo and Matt Bennett, finds that the value of unpaid care in England and Wales is now estimated to be £162 billion, exceeding that of the entire NHS budget in England for health service spending.<br/

Valuing Carers 2021:Northern Ireland

This research, undertaken by Centre for Care colleagues Jingwen Zhang, Maria Petrillo and Matt Bennett in collaboration with Carers NI, shows unpaid carers are saving Northern Ireland’s health service £5.8 billion per yea

Underachieving Gifted Students: Two Case Studies

Almost half of all gifted students do not achieve according to their exceptional potential. Though significant research has investigated identifying characteristics of underachieving gifted students, current research is yet to fully employ the established theoretical knowledge to determine practical strategies for the reversal and remediation of underachievement in gifted students. This study utilised a specifically designed Creative Writing Program and adopted a part-time withdrawal strategy to explore the impact of particular teaching strategies on reversing the underachievement of two gifted students. Through the two case studies, qualitative data were gathered from multiple sources and perspectives. These data were analysed using open-coding methods. The Creative Writing Program was found to impact the students\u27 negative feelings, underachieving behaviours and social awareness. Furthermore, a number of teaching strategies were identified as being successful for facilitating the achievement of potential in underachieving gifted students: one-to-one teaching, positive teacher identification and differentiation

Cycles of caring:transitions in and out of unpaid care

Our new research, undertaken by Centre for Care colleagues, Maria Petrillo, Matt Bennett and Gwilym Pryce, is released for Carers Rights Day (24th November 2022) and shows the astonishing numbers of people in the UK starting or ending an unpaid caring role each year

The Carrot and the Stick? Strategies to Improve Compliance with College Campus Tobacco Policies

Objective: Tobacco-free policies are being rapidly adopted nationwide, yet compliance with these policies remains a challenge. This study explored college campus key informants\u27 experiences with tobacco policies, and their perceived benefits, drawbacks, and outcomes. Participants: The sample for this study was 68 key informants representing 16 different California universities with varying tobacco policies (no smoking indoors and within 20 feet of entrances, designated smoking areas, 100% smoke-free, and 100% tobacco-free). Methods: Qualitative, descriptive study. Semistructured interviews were transcribed verbatim and analyzed using content analysis. Results: Strategies to improve compliance ranged from a social approach to a heavy focus on punitive enforcement. Key informants from campuses using a social approach alone reported barriers to improving compliance, including a perceived lack of efficacy of the approach. However, these campuses found it challenging to incorporate enforcement through campus police or security. Conclusions: College campus decision makers should explore using a combined approach (social approach as well as formal enforcement), with enforcement primarily the responsibility of nonpolice university channels (eg, Student Affairs, employee supervisors)

Gender differentials and old age survival in the Nairobi slums, Kenya

This paper examines gender differentials in survival amongst older people (50+ years) in the Nairobi slums and to the best of our knowledge is the first study of its kind in an urban African setting. The results provide evidence contrary to the expected paradox of poorer self-rated health yet better survival amongst older women. Older women in the Nairobi slums have poorer self-rated health and poorer circumstances across other factors, including disability and socio-economic status. Further, older women in the slums do not have better survival. The conventional female advantage in mortality only becomes apparent after accounting for the cumulative influence of individual characteristics, social networks, health and socio-economic status, suggesting the female advantage in unadjusted old-age mortality does not apply to contexts where women experience significant disadvantage across multiple life domains. This highlights the urgent need to redress the support, status and opportunities available for women across the life course in contexts such as the Nairobi slums. In addition, a greater number of factors differentiate mortality risk amongst men than amongst women, suggesting inequality amongst slum dwelling older men and highlighting the need for gender sensitive interventions which account for the particular needs of both genders in old age

A two-year field study with transgenic Bacillus thuringiensis maize: effects on soil microorganisms

We evaluated the changes of some soil microbiological characteristics due to the use of transgenic maize expressing Bacillus thuringiensis (Bt) toxin. A two-year field experiment was conducted (2003 and 2004). Two lines of transgenic Bt maize that express the Cry1Ab protein (event 176 and MON 810) and their near-isogenic non-Bt lines were used. Rhizosphere and non-rhizosphere soils were collected and measurements were performed during the maize cultural cycle and immediately at pre-harvest. Key soil microbiological parameters measured included the numbers of culturable aerobic bacteria, including actinomycetes, and fungi, the activity of dehydrogenase and nitrogenase enzymes and ATP content. There were clear seasonal effects in the microbial parameters as evidenced by the consistent changes in sampling dates across the two years. Differences in the measured variables were also observed between rhizosphere and non-rhizosphere soils. However, under our field conditions, the presence of Bt maize did not cause, in a general way, changes in the microbial populations of the soil or in the activity of the microbial communit