Technology-Based Training with Social Work Students to Enhance Suicide Risk Assessment Skills During COVID-19

The global COVID-19 pandemic has touched every aspect of human life. It has exacerbated how students continue to learn during a global health crisis. Specifically, training students to address mental health challenges (i.e., suicide assessments) during and post-COVID-19 is of the utmost importance. Previous research shows higher education institutions\u27 responses to adjusting to previous world health crises, yet little is known about social work programs pivoting to technology-based training to educate BSW and MSW students to continue serving vulnerable populations in their field practicum during COVID-19. In this study, using the competencies attainment survey, the researchers at an east coast institution explored the confidence levels of social work students\u27 technology-based training on suicide risk assessments and comfort with using artificial intelligence technology. The results showed a statistically significant increase in students’ reports of increased self-confidence in their skills to conduct suicide risk assessments and self-confidence in the use of technology. The discussion includes implications for social work education

The Effects of Probation Stipulations on Employment Outcomes and Feelings of Employability Among Probationers in Rhode Island

Roughly 8,400 of the 24,000 people under the purview of the Rhode Island Department of Corrections are on active probation. These 8,400 people must regularly attend meetings with their probation officer, court appointments, drug treatment programs, mental health counseling, and various crime-specific stipulations (such as anger management groups). There is minimal evidence to suggest that mandating these stipulations reduce a probationer’s likelihood to be rearrested. There is a wealth of evidence to suggest that having a job does decrease the likelihood that a probationer will be rearrested. The effect probation stipulations have on a probationer’s employment outcomes is unknown. Also unknown is the influence that probation stipulations have on a probationer’s perceptions of their own employability (self-perceptions of ability to find and maintain a job). This study, utilizing a cross-sectional design and collecting data from Rhode Island probationers via survey (n= 170), explores existing correlations between probation stipulations, employment outcomes, and perceptions of employability. Results suggest that probation stipulations are negatively correlated with some employment outcomes and perceptions of employability and that probationers who feel supported by their probation officer have better outcomes and perceptions than those probationers who do not feel supported by their probation officer. Relationships, though significant, are not substantive, as effect sizes are minimal to moderate. Further research with a larger sample size and conducted longitudinally may better explain correlations uncovered in this research

Aerobically respiring prokaryotic strains exhibit a broader temperature–pH–salinity space for cell division than anaerobically respiring and fermentative strains

Biological processes on the Earth operate within a parameter space that is constrained by physical and chemical extremes. Aerobic respiration can result in adenosine triphosphate yields up to over an order of magnitude higher than those attained anaerobically and, under certain conditions, may enable microbial multiplication over a broader range of extremes than other modes of catabolism. We employed growth data published for 241 prokaryotic strains to compare temperature, pH and salinity values for cell division between aerobically and anaerobically metabolizing taxa. Isolates employing oxygen as the terminal electron acceptor exhibited a considerably more extensive three-dimensional phase space for cell division (90% of the total volume) than taxa using other inorganic substrates or organic compounds as the electron acceptor (15% and 28% of the total volume, respectively), with all groups differing in their growth characteristics. Understanding the mechanistic basis of these differences will require integration of research into microbial ecology, physiology and energetics, with a focus on global-scale processes. Critical knowledge gaps include the combined impacts of diverse stress parameters on Gibbs energy yields and rates of microbial activity, interactions between cellular energetics and adaptations to extremes, and relating laboratory-based data to in situ limits for cell division