Evaluation of a social skills program for children.

The purpose of this study was to evaluate the effectiveness of a social skills program designed to improve the behavior, social skills, and coping skills of children with learning disabilities. This type of program could also have potential benefits for children without LD who have social skills deficiencies. The current study focused on the impact of the 10-week Better Emotional and Social Times program delivered through the Windsor-Essex chapter of the Learning Disabilities Association of Ontario for 36 children (28 boys, 8 girls), 8 to 12 years of age, from Southwestern Ontario. These children completed pre- and post-treatment the Social Skills Rating System as a measure of social skills and the Piers-Harris Children\u27s Self-Concept Scale as a measure of self-concept. T-tests were conducted comparing pre- and post-treatment scores on the inventories. Results indicated that significant improvements occurred in parent rating of assertion, cooperation, responsibility, internalizing behaviors, and social skills and problem behaviors in general. Improvements were found in the children\u27s rating of intellectual and school status only. When examining subgroups, it was found that items indicating improvements in responsibility, internalizing behavior, hyperactivity, and overall problem behaviors were endorsed by parents of children with ADD/ADHD diagnoses. Parents of children with primary deficits in the verbal domain of cognitive functioning endorsed items indicating an improvement in cooperation, self-control, and social skills in general. For children with primary deficits in the nonverbal domain of intellectual functioning, parents reported a decrease in overall problem behaviors and improvements were found in child rating of cooperation. These results and their relation to previous research are discussed and limitations of the present study as well as suggestions for future research are also presented.Dept. of Psychology. Paper copy at Leddy Library: Theses & Major Papers - Basement, West Bldg. / Call Number: Thesis2004 .D78. Source: Masters Abstracts International, Volume: 43-03, page: 1007. Adviser: Joseph E. Casey. Thesis (M.A.)--University of Windsor (Canada), 2004

The Homodimeric Kinesin, Kif17, is Essential for Vertebrate Photoreceptor Sensory Outer Segment Development

Sensory cilia and intraflagellar transport (IFT), a pathway essential for ciliogenesis, play important roles in embryonic development and cell differentiation. In vertebrate photoreceptors IFT is required for the early development of ciliated sensory outer segments (OS), an elaborate organelle that sequesters the many proteins comprising the phototransduction machinery. As in other cilia and flagella, heterotrimeric members of the kinesin 2 family have been implicated as the anterograde IFT motor in OS. However, in Caenorhabditis elegans, OSM-3, a homodimeric kinesin 2 motor, plays an essential role in some, but not all sensory cilia. Kif17, a vertebrate OSM-3 homologue, is known for its role in dendritic trafficking in neurons, but a function in ciliogenesis has not been determined. We show that in zebrafish Kif17 is widely expressed in the nervous system and retina. In photoreceptors Kif17 co-localizes with IFT proteins within the OS, and co-immunoprecipitates with IFT proteins. Knockdown of Kif17 has little if any effect in early embryogenesis, including the formation of motile sensory cilia in the pronephros. However, OS formation and targeting of the visual pigment protein is severely disrupted. Our analysis shows that Kif17 is essential for photoreceptor OS development, and suggests that Kif17 plays a cell type specific role in vertebrate ciliogenesis

Surface Measure to Depth (SMeTD): a new low-budget system for 3D water temperature measurements for combining with UAV-based thermal infrared imagery

Acknowledgements This work was funded by the School of Geosciences, University of Aberdeen, and the Macaulay Development Trust. We would like to thank Dr. Katya Dimitrova Petrova, Dr. Irma Arts, Douglas Wardell-Johnson and Lucas Christie for their assistance in the field. Funding This work was funded by the School of Geosciences, University of Aberdeen, and the Macaulay Development Trust.Peer reviewedPublisher PD

Occupational Therapist Licensure Revocation by State Licensing Boards

Occupational therapists must abide by certain standards to maintain a license to practice. Despite the existence of various studies on licensure revocation in other health care professions, no prior research has been conducted regarding occupational therapist licensure revocations. The purpose of this study was to examine reasons for occupational therapy licensure revocations in the United States from 2005 to 2015. A retrospective descriptive study design was completed. Data were collected from public databases on state websites or through communication with state licensure board representatives. From 2005 to 2015, 65 occupational therapists had their licenses revoked in 40 states and the District of Columbia. Fraud and criminal conviction were the two most frequently cited reasons for licensure revocations in the majority female sample. The south region of the United States displayed the most license revocations when compared to other regions. The results of this study may enhance the education of occupational therapists, occupational therapy assistants, and students about ethical decision-making in practice. A standardized protocol used by all states in determining licensure revocation is recommended. Additional research on all occupational therapy disciplinary actions could further benefit occupational therapy curricula

Shining Light on Modifications of Gravity

Many modifications of gravity introduce new scalar degrees of freedom, and in such theories matter fields typically couple to an effective metric that depends on both the true metric of spacetime and on the scalar field and its derivatives. Scalar field contributions to the effective metric can be classified as conformal and disformal. Disformal terms introduce gradient couplings between scalar fields and the energy momentum tensor of other matter fields, and cannot be constrained by fifth force experiments because the effects of these terms are trivial around static non-relativistic sources. The use of high-precision, low-energy photon experiments to search for conformally coupled scalar fields, called axion-like particles, is well known. In this article we show that these experiments are also constraining for disformal scalar field theories, and are particularly important because of the difficulty of constraining these couplings with other laboratory experiments.Comment: 20 pages, 10 figures. v2: Matches version accepted by JCAP; additional discussion of the strong coupling scale. Conclusions unchange

O Ecodesign aplicado no desenvolvimento de compósitos - Um estudo de caso na indústria de base de calçados

Descrição de uma metodologia de design utilizada para aprimorar desempenhos e custos para bases de calçados à base de poliuretano, através dos princípios básicos do ecodesign, trazendo de volta ao ciclo produtivo um resíduo de alto desempenho que seria descartado. O objetivo é de adicionar pó de resíduo industrial de MDF, proveniente da indústria moveleira ao poliuretano, resultando em um compósito de melhor desempenho e menor custo. São descritos os passos necessários para o desenvolvimento do compósito e a sua aplicação em base de calçados

Screening and brief interventions for hazardous and harmful alcohol use in primary care: a cluster randomised controlled trial protocol

A large number of randomised controlled trials in health settings have consistently reported positive effects of brief intervention in terms of reductions in alcohol use. However,although alcohol misuse is common amongst offenders, there is limited evidence of alcohol brief interventions in the criminal justice field. This factorial pragmatic cluster randomised controlledtrial with Offender Managers (OMs) as the unit of randomisation will evaluate the effectiveness and cost-effectiveness of different models of screening to identify hazardous and harmful drinkers in probation and different intensities of brief intervention to reduce excessive drinking in probation clients. Ninety-six OMs from 9 probation areas across 3 English regions (the NorthEast Region (n = 4) and London and the South East Regions (n = 5)) will be recruited. OMs will berandomly allocated to one of three intervention conditions: a client information leaflet control condition (n = 32 OMs); 5-minute simple structured advice (n = 32 OMs) and 20-minute brieflifestyle counselling delivered by an Alcohol Health Worker (n = 32 OMs). Randomisation will be stratified by probation area. To test the relative effectiveness of different screening methods all OMs will be randomised to either the Modified Single Item Screening Questionnaire (M-SASQ) orthe Fast Alcohol Screening Test (FAST). There will be a minimum of 480 clients recruited into the trial. There will be an intention to treat analysis of study outcomes at 6 and 12 months postintervention. Analysis will include client measures (screening result, weekly alcohol consumption,alcohol-related problems, re-offending, public service use and quality of life) and implementation measures from OMs (the extent of screening and brief intervention beyond the minimum recruitment threshold will provide data on acceptability and feasibility of different models of brief intervention). We will also examine the practitioner and organisational factors associated with successful implementation.The trial will evaluate the impact of screening and brief alcohol intervention in routine probation work and therefore its findings will be highly relevant to probation teams and thus the criminal justice system in the UK

The Effectiveness of Alcohol Screening and Brief Intervention in Emergency Departments: A Multicentre Pragmatic Cluster Randomized Controlled Trial

BACKGROUND: Alcohol misuse is common in people attending emergency departments (EDs) and there is some evidence of efficacy of alcohol screening and brief interventions (SBI). This study investigated the effectiveness of SBI approaches of different intensities delivered by ED staff in nine typical EDs in England: the SIPS ED trial. METHODS AND FINDINGS: Pragmatic multicentre cluster randomized controlled trial of SBI for hazardous and harmful drinkers presenting to ED. Nine EDs were randomized to three conditions: a patient information leaflet (PIL), 5 minutes of brief advice (BA), and referral to an alcohol health worker who provided 20 minutes of brief lifestyle counseling (BLC). The primary outcome measure was the Alcohol Use Disorders Identification Test (AUDIT) status at 6 months. Of 5899 patients aged 18 or more presenting to EDs, 3737 (63·3%) were eligible to participate and 1497 (40·1%) screened positive for hazardous or harmful drinking, of whom 1204 (80·4%) gave consent to participate in the trial. Follow up rates were 72% (n?=?863) at six, and 67% (n?=?810) at 12 months. There was no evidence of any differences between intervention conditions for AUDIT status or any other outcome measures at months 6 or 12 in an intention to treat analysis. At month 6, compared to the PIL group, the odds ratio of being AUDIT negative for brief advice was 1·103 (95% CI 0·328 to 3·715). The odds ratio comparing BLC to PIL was 1·247 (95% CI 0·315 to 4·939). A per protocol analysis confirmed these findings. CONCLUSIONS: SBI is difficult to implement in typical EDs. The results do not support widespread implementation of alcohol SBI in ED beyond screening followed by simple clinical feedback and alcohol information, which is likely to be easier and less expensive to implement than more complex interventions