No Money, Mo’ Problems: The Attitudes and Experiences of Homeowners in Default

This article discusses differences in foreclosure law, consumer protection, and mediation programs. Then, it will summarize relevant research on the topic of homeowners’ attitudes, financial knowledge, economic hardships, causes of default, and effectiveness of representation. Next, this article will outline the study’s design and methodology followed by the results from the data produced by the study. Then, the results will be analyzed. Finally, policy recommendations and reforms supported by the study’s evidence will be discussed

Giant Gamma-ray Bubbles from Fermi-LAT: AGN Activity or Bipolar Galactic Wind?

Data from the Fermi-LAT reveal two large gamma-ray bubbles, extending 50 degrees above and below the Galactic center, with a width of about 40 degrees in longitude. The gamma-ray emission associated with these bubbles has a significantly harder spectrum (dN/dE ~ E^-2) than the IC emission from electrons in the Galactic disk, or the gamma-rays produced by decay of pions from proton-ISM collisions. There is no significant spatial variation in the spectrum or gamma-ray intensity within the bubbles, or between the north and south bubbles. The bubbles are spatially correlated with the hard-spectrum microwave excess known as the WMAP haze; the edges of the bubbles also line up with features in the ROSAT X-ray maps at 1.5-2 keV. We argue that these Galactic gamma-ray bubbles were most likely created by some large episode of energy injection in the Galactic center, such as past accretion events onto the central massive black hole, or a nuclear starburst in the last ~10 Myr. Dark matter annihilation/decay seems unlikely to generate all the features of the bubbles and the associated signals in WMAP and ROSAT; the bubbles must be understood in order to use measurements of the diffuse gamma-ray emission in the inner Galaxy as a probe of dark matter physics. Study of the origin and evolution of the bubbles also has the potential to improve our understanding of recent energetic events in the inner Galaxy and the high-latitude cosmic ray population.Comment: 46 pages, 28 figures, accepted by Ap

An examination of the factors that influence the publication or non-publication of mental health nursing research presented at national or international nursing conferences

Mental health nurses are required to be able to identify and access the current evidence surrounding a particular topic and evaluate and decide upon the best care approach to people with mental health problems. This is aided by specific guidance on how to facilitate access to and deliver the best quality evidence-based care. This is most commonly acquired by accessing evidence through hand searching publications or through electronic sources (databases, web search engines or internet publications). However, evidence indicates that only a small proportion of mental health nursing research is published and that many nurses carry out research that is not published. Although, it is difficult to judge the quality of unpublished research the likelihood is that a number of high quality mental health nursing research projects are not published and are therefore not available to be evaluated as part of the evidence base of care. There has been relatively little examination of the reasons underpinning publication of nursing research. This project examined the factors that influence the publication or non-publication of mental health nursing research presented at national or international nursing conferences in the UK

Population Structure and Mating Dynamics in the Social Amoeba Dictyostelium discoideum

Successfully investigating the evolution and maintenance of sex and mating systems can often have as much to do with choosing the right study system as it has to do with asking the right questions. Dictyostelium discoideum has long been the focus of researchers interested in understanding a number of biological processes, such as motility, chemotaxis and development. More recently, attentions have shifted to include questions about the evolution of social and sexual interactions both within and between species. The D. discoideum life cycles, both asexual and sexual, are uniquely social, each requiring a costly sacrificial act. This offers an ideal system for exploring questions about kin recognition, conflict, and the evolution of multicellularity, as well as the evolution of differential sexual investment and mating types. This dissertation focused on understanding the phylogenetic and geographical relationships between clones in D. discoideum and identifying the social and selective pressures that shape its mating system. I introduce this mating system in Chapter 1. In Chapter 2, I investigated genetic variation and population structure in D. discoideum to identify possible factors that could affect interactions between clones. I used DNA sequence data and phylogenetic techniques to show that though D. discoideum clones form a monophyletic group, there is evidence of genetic differentiation among locations (FST = 0.242, P = 0.011), suggesting geographic or other barriers limit gene flow between populations. In chapter 3, I again looked for population structure, this time concentrating on gamete size and sex ratio, to understand selective pressures maintaining multiple mating types in D. discoideum. Evidence suggests that both balancing selection and drift are likely acting on the D. discoideum mating system. I found no differences in gamete size across the three mating types and also no genetic differentiation across three wild populations at the mating type locus. However, I found that mating type frequency varied across these populations, likely due to drift. Chapter 4 focused on understanding the social dynamics of mating in D. discoideum. During macrocyst formation, two cells of complementary mating types fuse to form a zygote. This zygote then consumes hundreds of surrounding amoebae, likely clones of the original two cells, for use as protection and food. I varied the frequencies at which two clones of differing mating types interacted to investigate the possibility that one mating type cheats another by differentially contributing to the cannibalized cells. Contrary to previous claims that mating type I induces mating type II, coercing it to contribute disproportionately more of these cannibalized cells during macrocyst production, I found that these cells are likely contributed relative to their frequency in the population, regardless of mating type. However, I did find evidence for differential contribution to macrocyst production between some pairs of clones, suggesting that cheating can happen between partners during sex, but is rare and clone-specific. Overall, these studies looked for evidence of underlying population structure in D. discoideum that could impact our understanding of social and sexual interactions in this species. I also applied questions about the maintenance of sex usually only asked in two-sex systems to the unique social sexual interactions within D. discoideum in order to expand the understanding of how mating systems evolve and are maintained in nature. I developed and used new tools and techniques for observing the processes important to understanding this unique system and identified genetic and social factors that could impact how individuals interact during both the asexual and sexual life cycles

Consistent Scenarios for Cosmic-Ray Excesses from Sommerfeld-Enhanced Dark Matter Annihilation

Anomalies in direct and indirect detection have motivated models of dark matter consisting of a multiplet of nearly-degenerate states, coupled by a new GeV-scale interaction. We perform a careful analysis of the thermal freezeout of dark matter annihilation in such a scenario. We compute the range of "boost factors" arising from Sommerfeld enhancement in the local halo for models which produce the correct relic density, and show the effect of including constraints on the saturated enhancement from the cosmic microwave background (CMB). We find that boost factors from Sommerfeld enhancement of up to ~800 are possible in the local halo. When the CMB bounds on the saturated enhancement are applied, the maximal boost factor is reduced to ~400 for 1-2 TeV dark matter and sub-GeV force carriers, but remains large enough to explain the observed Fermi and PAMELA electronic signals. We describe regions in the DM mass-boost factor plane where the cosmic ray data is well fit for a range of final states, and show that Sommerfeld enhancement alone is enough to provide the large annihilation cross sections required to fit the data, although for light mediator masses (less than ~200 MeV) there is tension with the CMB constraints in the absence of astrophysical boost factors from substructure. Additionally, we consider the circumstances under which WIMPonium formation is relevant and find for heavy WIMPs (greater than ~2 TeV) and soft-spectrum annihilation channels it can be an important consideration; we find regions with dark matter mass greater than 2.8 TeV that are consistent with the CMB bounds and have ~600-700 present-day boost factors.Comment: Related web application at http://astrometry.fas.harvard.edu/mvogelsb/sommerfeld . v2: added brief clarification regarding propagation parameters, plots now show effect of relaxing CMB bounds. 35 pages in JCAP format, 4 figures. Accepted for publication in JCA

Searching for Dark Matter in the CMB: A Compact Parameterization of Energy Injection from New Physics

High-precision measurements of the temperature and polarization anisotropies of the cosmic microwave background radiation have been previously employed to set robust constraints on dark matter annihilation during recombination. In this work we improve and generalize these constraints to apply to energy deposition during the recombination era with arbitrary redshift dependence. Our approach also provides more rigorous and model-independent bounds on dark matter annihilation and decay scenarios. We employ principal component analysis to identify a basis of weighting functions for the energy deposition. The coefficients of these weighting functions parameterize any energy deposition model and can be constrained directly by experiment. For generic energy deposition histories that are currently allowed by WMAP7 data, up to 3 principal component coefficients are measurable by Planck and up to 5 coefficients are measurable by an ideal cosmic variance limited experiment. For WIMP dark matter, our analysis demonstrates that the effect on the CMB is described well by a single (normalization) parameter and a "universal" redshift dependence for the energy deposition history. We give WMAP 7 constraints on both generic energy deposition histories and the universal WIMP case.Comment: 30 pages, 24 figure

Parents’ perspectives and experiences of parenting and caring for young children on a low income in the North East Scotland.

Background: Families with young children, and lone parent families in particular, are at greater risk of poverty and food insecurity, compared to other UK population groups. Tackling child poverty has been a key Scottish Government policy since the introduction of the Child Poverty Act (2017) in which local authorities and health boards are required to report on their Local Child Poverty Action Plans. In north east Scotland little formal research had focused on the lived experiences of parents and parents of infants and young children in relation to the challenges they face parenting on very low incomes, and, on questions about income maximisation strategies to alleviate child poverty. This paper focuses on some key findings of a study undertaken to address this knowledge gap in Grampian in 2020. Methods: Parents with young children supported by an Aberdeen City-based poverty alleviation social enterprise were invited to take part in an interview study. One-to-one semi-structured telephone interviews lasting between 30–40 minutes took place during July and August 2020. Interviews were transcribed and thematically analysed. Results: Ten women took part; two participants lived with partners. Eight participants were unemployed and two worked part-time. Each had between one and five child(ren), and all had one child under school-age. Five key impact themes emerged, i. limited participation in paid employment; ii. insufficient social security income; iii. household food insecurity experiences; iv. practical and emotional challenges and anxiety associated with their children’s overall development; and v. anxieties related to treats and special occasions. Four coping strategy themes were also revealed, i.e. i. budgeting and bill prioritisation; ii. self-sacrifice; iii. relying on others, and iv. keeping up appearances. Food coping strategies were explored in more depth, and two broad themes emerged: acquisition methods and management techniques. Discussion: Parents with young children experience significant barriers accessing paid employment due to caring responsibilities. Consequently, generating sufficient household income from alternate income sources, such as social security, is problematic. Parents reported devoting significant emotional and physical energy to dealing with the challenges of raising children in poverty, and it was notable that participants employed a range of sophisticated coping strategies and skill to make ends meet and maximise food resources, within highly constrained budgets. This research challenges notions that budgeting education initiatives have much to offer low income parents already well-versed on this issue. Strategies to increase their incomes seem a more effective way of alleviating their related anxieties

Low income parents’ perspectives and experiences of engaging with early years health professionals about financial challenges and income maximisation.

Background: Since the introduction of the Child Poverty Act (2017) in Scotland, all health visitors, midwives and family nurses in Scotland are expected to screen and offer a financial advice referral to at-risk pregnant women and parents/carers of families with children under five in Scotland. The so-called ‘Financial Inclusion Pathway’(FIP) emerged in 2019 as one of a number of strategies intended to tackle child poverty. At this early implementation stage, little is known about parents’ perspectives about the acceptability or impact of this initiative in relation to its aim. Methods: In 2020, low income parents with young children living in Aberdeen City were invited to take part in a qualitative study that aimed to determine any challenges they might face engaging with the FIP policy in practice, and their perspectives about financial discussions with professionals that could help to increase household incomes through this approach. One-to-one semi-structured telephone interviews lasting between 30–40 minutes took place during July and August 2020. Interviews were fully transcribed and thematically analysed. Results: Ten women, ranging from ages 20–41 years. Each participant had between one and five child(ren), ranging in age from 2 to 18 years and all had one child under school-age. All lived in multiply deprived postcode areas within Aberdeen City. Three main themes emerged: i. difficulties associated with discussing financial concerns; ii. how to talk about the issue; iii. intervention utility. Within each of these three main themes, nine-sub themes were apparent, ranging from those indicating potential unintended negative consequences, as well as intervention benefits. Discussion: Most participants considered health visitors to be a potentially good source of help about financial challenges; they were less clear about midwives’ role here. However, parents’ perceptions of the problems they may face associated with disclosing financial difficulties to health professionals, is a distinct barrier to conversations that could lead to a financial advice referral. Given the levels of unclaimed benefit in the UK, this is important to note. Establishing trust and rapport, careful and sensitive enquiry, and positive framing of financial maximisation were recommended to aid discussion of financial challenges. These findings are important given the current and predicted economic impact of the COVID-19. The study is limited by its sample size and recruitment site, but provides valuable insights to inform a larger scale investigation. The study also indicates the importance of understanding health professionals’ associated views and experiences