Social support and Quality of Life: a cross-sectional study on survivors eight months after the 2008 Wenchuan earthquake

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>The 2008 Wenchuan earthquake resulted in extensive loss of life and physical and psychological injuries for survivors. This research examines the relationship between social support and health-related quality of life for the earthquake survivors.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>A multistage cluster sampling strategy was employed to select participants from 11 shelters in nine counties exposed to different degrees of earthquake damage, for a questionnaire survey. The participants were asked to complete the Short Form 36 and the Social Support Rating Scale eight months after the earthquake struck. A total of 1617 participants returned the questionnaires. The quality of life of the survivors (in the four weeks preceding the survey) was compared with that of the general population in the region. Multivariate logistic regression analysis and canonical correlation analysis were performed to determine the association between social support and quality of life.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>The earthquake survivors reported poorer quality of life than the general population, with an average of 4.8% to 19.62% reduction in scores of the SF-36 (p < 0.001). The multivariate logistic regression analysis showed that those with stronger social support were more likely to have better quality of life. The canonical correlation analysis found that there was a discrepancy between actual social support received and perceived social support available, and the magnitude of this discrepancy was inversely related to perceived general health (rs = 0.467), and positively related to mental health (rs = 0.395).</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>Social support is associated with quality of life in the survivors of the earthquake. More attention needs to be paid to increasing social support for those with poorer mental health.</p

The Views of Engineering Students on Creativity, In Contributions to Higher Engineering Education

Creativity plays a growing role in education, from elementary school to higher education. Nowadays, both employers and universities develop research and are committed to the development of the twenty-first-century interpersonal, applied skills—creativity included—foreseen as fundamental to all professionals, engineers added. Generally, engineering degrees focus on the content of their scientific areas. In some higher education degrees, creativity still plays a small role. In order to reinforce the importance of creativity in the engineering degrees in a Portuguese northeastern university, it was pertinent to study the conceptions of engineering students about creativity. This study presents the conceptions of creativity of the first-year students of higher education, in the engineering area in two school years. The answers of 128 first-year students from two academic years (61 from 2014/15 and 67 from 2016/17) and four different degrees to the open question—“What is creativity?” were analyzed. It was a mixed study, qualitative to deepen students’ conceptions and quantitative to study some proportions differences and variables crossing. The results show low personal involvement even in the use of the first person plural in either school year, although the students’ most used sentence was “for me.” In both academic years, students’ definitions mentioned more the creation of the implicit category in the content analysis. The words “new” and “way” were common to all the word clouds produced, and creativity and innovation appear somehow connected. In general, proportion differences were not statistically significant and degree crossed with categories showed no dependency

A Method to identify talented aspiring designers in use of personas with personality

Personnel engaged in developing applications using User-Centred Design (UCD) techniques need to have special abilities and training to design products that meet the needs of users. Persona, an archetypical user, is used for design of applications. Persona with personality is deemed to better represent a user as personality provides a richer profile and affects the way users interact with technology. This paper presents a novel technique to identify talented aspiring designers in use of persona with personality. We authored four personas with different personality traits. Thirty-three participants completed a spatial ability test, answered personality trait questionnaires and performed a design activity. Our assessment of design artefacts indicate that participants who score high in imagination personality factor and spatial ability tests are talented designers in the use of personas with personality within UCD methodologies. The implication of our study is that the talented designers can be identified and utilised more productively.22 page(s