Motivational Interviewing to Enhance Weight Loss and Eating Self-Efficacy in Overweight and Obese Adults

Greater than six in ten adults in the United States are overweight or obese which can lead to cardiovascular disease, Type II Diabetes, joint injury and some forms of cancer, costing billions of healthcare dollars each year. Weight loss is difficult, as is maintaining weight loss. The purpose of this project is to investigate if use of the evidenced based (EB) intervention, motivational interviewing (MI), will enhance weight loss and eating self-efficacy (ESE) in overweight and obese adults seeking weight loss at a weight loss clinic over the course of eight weeks. Participants who received MI in addition to current weight loss strategies lost significantly more weight (-2.74 kg, p \u3c .05) between the four and eight week visits as compared patients who did not receive MI (-1.3222 kg). The overall weight change over the course of this eight week study in patients who received MI was -6.7733 kg as compared to patients who did not receive MI which was -4.5717 kg. ESE was significantly improved from the initial visit of 4.8733 (p \u3c .05) to the four week visit of 4.6733 (p \u3c .05) and 4.3267 (p \u3c .05) at eight weeks in participants who received monthly MI sessions. Keywords: Weight Loss, Motivational Interviewing, Obesity, Self-efficac

The Alignment of Self-Perception, Stereotypes, and Career Traits

This study explores gendered inequities in STEM fields by examining the intersectionality of self-perception, stereotypes, and gender across career goals. Self-perception strongly influences career decisions and is often affected by societal stereotypes and dated views on the roles of men and women. Gender biases are evident in male dominated science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) fields (Franzway et al. 2019). Previous research has solely focused on how self-perception is linked to the undergraduate female performance (Jones et al, 2013). Female centered studies create a gap in understanding the impact of gender inequity on students in STEM based programs. Expanding the scope to include female and male experiences in a variety of STEM and non-STEM careers creates a more accurate relationship between one’s self-perception and success in chosen career. In this study, participants were asked to list their five most salient personality traits. They were then asked to list the three traits they considered most critical for success in two STEM and two non-STEM related careers. To conclude, participants were asked to state their intended profession. This study tested the hypothesis that males would consistently list traits associated with engineers and scientists, i.e., hard-skill descriptors, whereas females would list traits consistent with teachers and nurses, i.e., soft-skill descriptors. It is anticipated that this will hold for men and women regardless of their career goals, highlighting how gendered career stereotypes and self-perception can hold students back in their careers. Understanding the implications of this dated gendered self-perception can inform STEM education and create a more progressive and equitable STEM culture

A Rapid Review of Internet Mediated Research Methods with People with Dementia: Practical, Technical and Ethical Considerations

Doing research with People with Dementia (PwD) can be challenging given that disease symptoms of anxiety, forgetfulness, and fluctuating mental capacity can make recruitment and data collection difficult. Once COVID-19 made face-to-face data collection impractical, using internet-based methods became an alternative option to continue with research. However, data collection with PwD over the internet requires strategies to observe, support, and enable them to engage with research, especially with qualitative approaches. Nine articles were selected via a decade rapid scoping review (undertaken March-June 2020) to identify qualitative online methods used with PwD and associated challenges. Methods used were online interviews, clinical assessment/telemedicine, and textual analysis from blogs, forum posts, and Tweets created by PwD. Practical challenges identified: the researchers’ limited ability to manage the physical and social environment. Technical challenges identified: the need for a high degree of technical support for participants prior and during data collection. Ethical challenges identified, negotiating confidentiality, obtaining valid informed consent, and ensuring data security. Implicit findings found related to how researchers perceived and treated online data retrieved from the internet and how the challenges mentioned in the included articles did not link to dementia symptoms

From Sit-Forward to Lean-Back: Using a Mobile Device to Vary Interactive Pace

Although online, handheld, mobile computers offer new possibilities in searching and retrieving information on the go, the fast-paced, “sit -forward” style of interaction may not be appropriate for all user search needs. In this paper, we explore how a handheld computer can be used to enable interactive search experiences that vary in pace from fast and immediate through to reflective and delayed. We describe a system that asynchronously combines an offline handheld computer and an online desktop Personal Computer, and discuss some results of an initial user evaluation

THE UBERCRYPT FRAMEWORK: A NEW APPROACH IN CRYPTOSYSTEMS

This article describes a novel and unique cryptosystem making use of a small set of private security parameters and public initialization values to produce a pseudorandom byte stream with large period. The byte stream can be used as a one-time stream cipher for securing communication between parties and for data archival. The cryptosystem makes use of geometry and number theory to generate a set of large prime integers and then from the primes a column-periodic matrix of bytes from which further calculation produces a pseudorandom, long period byte stream. The cryptosystem is extensible in that additional private user-supplied security parameters can supplement the private geometric security parameters while adding strength in the process. The article discusses the design and operation of the system and lists many potential questions of interest to the community of mathematical and cryptological researchers. Foremost among these questions are determining the most appropriate method for assessing the cryptographic strength of the algorithm and determining any weaknesses in the security of the algorithm

Emergent complex neural dynamics

A large repertoire of spatiotemporal activity patterns in the brain is the basis for adaptive behaviour. Understanding the mechanism by which the brain's hundred billion neurons and hundred trillion synapses manage to produce such a range of cortical configurations in a flexible manner remains a fundamental problem in neuroscience. One plausible solution is the involvement of universal mechanisms of emergent complex phenomena evident in dynamical systems poised near a critical point of a second-order phase transition. We review recent theoretical and empirical results supporting the notion that the brain is naturally poised near criticality, as well as its implications for better understanding of the brain

An investigation into the age and origin of Suranga in the foothills of the Western Ghats of India

This document is the Accepted Manuscript version. The final publication is available at Springer via: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12685-015-0125-yThis paper presents the evidence for determining the age and origin of suranga irrigation found mainly in southern Karnataka and northern Kerala in the foothills of the Western Ghats of south India. It draws on on-going research that has attempted to use an interdisciplinary approach to date the system using Indian Archives, British and Portuguese colonial archives, etymology, oral testimony archaeology, phenology and palaeo dating techniques. The results from this study put the origins of the system at around 1900–1940 CE. These results are compared with the current academic discourse that supports the view that the system originates from ancient Persia and qanat technology, because of the long established trade links with Persia and the Arabian Peninsula in the Malabar region. We argue that a new ‘origin discourse’ should be framed around these much more recent dates. The methodological constraints behind both theories are discussed throughout to enable the reader to appreciate the limitations of both arguments.Peer reviewedFinal Accepted Versio

Should Research Ethics Encourage the Production of Cost-Effective Interventions?

This project considers whether and how research ethics can contribute to the provision of cost-effective medical interventions. Clinical research ethics represents an underexplored context for the promotion of cost-effectiveness. In particular, although scholars have recently argued that research on less-expensive, less-effective interventions can be ethical, there has been little or no discussion of whether ethical considerations justify curtailing research on more expensive, more effective interventions. Yet considering cost-effectiveness at the research stage can help ensure that scarce resources such as tissue samples or limited subject popula- tions are employed where they do the most good; can support parallel efforts by providers and insurers to promote cost-effectiveness; and can ensure that research has social value and benefits subjects. I discuss and rebut potential objections to the consideration of cost-effectiveness in research, including the difficulty of predicting effectiveness and cost at the research stage, concerns about limitations in cost-effectiveness analysis, and worries about overly limiting researchers’ freedom. I then consider the advantages and disadvantages of having certain participants in the research enterprise, including IRBs, advisory committees, sponsors, investigators, and subjects, consider cost-effectiveness. The project concludes by qualifiedly endorsing the consideration of cost-effectiveness at the research stage. While incorporating cost-effectiveness considerations into the ethical evaluation of human subjects research will not on its own ensure that the health care system realizes cost-effectiveness goals, doing so nonetheless represents an important part of a broader effort to control rising medical costs