Cohabitation and the law: myths, money and the media

This chapter version has been deposited with the kind permission of Sage. The definitive version of this chapter was published by Sage in the 24th British Social Attitudes Report 2008, by Alison Park, John Curtice, Katarina Thomson, Miranda Phillips, Mark Johnson, Elizabeth Clery. ISBN: 9781412947749. Available at: http://www.uk.sagepub.com/books/Book231969The 2000 British Social Attitudes survey confirmed a growing social acceptance of heterosexual cohabitation as a partnering and parenting choice and identified strong public support for reform of cohabitation law. It also established the existence of a ‘common law marriage’ myth whereby the majority of the public, and cohabitants in particular, falsely believe that cohabiting couples who have lived together for some time have the same legal rights as married couples. Even among those cohabitants who were aware of their vulnerable legal position, it was found that very few had taken appropriate steps to gain or provide legal protection despite, as we found in subsequent research, often having good intentions to do so. These findings prompted widespread media interest and government concern. This led the Department for Constitutional Affairs (now the Ministry of Justice) to fund their 2004 Living Together Campaign, aimed at advising cohabitants about their legal rights and indicating practical steps they could take to gain marriage-like protection where possible. Subsequently, in 2005, with Scotland having already decided to reform the law relating to cohabiting couples (see Family Law (Scotland) Act 2006), the government decided to refer the issue of whether cohabitation law should be reformed to the Law Commission for England and Wales, a decision which sparked further media interest. The attention paid to cohabitation over the last few years makes it worth revisiting the subject, to see whether, and how, behaviour and attitudes are changing. So our first aim in this chapter is to examine the evolving prevalence and role of cohabitation as a relationship form in British society. Our second aim is to establish whether attitudes to cohabitation have changed, and whether legal knowledge and actions have increased following a period of sustained government and media focus. Finally, we consider public beliefs about cohabitants’ legal rights and financial practices. This latter issue is vital, as the courts may now take into account how cohabiting couples manage their money in deciding appropriate legal remedies on separation. Some of our key findings have already informed the deliberations of the Law Commission, due to report to Parliament in 2007, but this is the first full account of our research

Mary Wollstonecraft: A feminist exile in Paris

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Why Should ACT Work When CBT Has Failed? a Study Assessing Acceptability and Feasibility of Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) for Paediatric Patients With Chronic Fatigue Syndrome/myalgic Encephalomyelitis (CFS/ME)

AIMS: Paediatric chronic fatigue syndrome/myalgic encephalomyelitis (CFS/ME) effects 0.5–3.28% of children. NICE guidance recommends Activity Management, Graded Exercise Therapy or Cognitive Behavioural Therapy for fatigue (CBT-f). Approximately 15% of patients do not achieve full recovery within one year with current treatments. Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) is an effective treatment in many chronic illnesses. There are no studies investigating ACT for paediatric CFS/ME. This feasability study aimed to assess if ACT is a feasible and acceptable alternative treatment when current treatment has not led to recovery. METHODS: This feasability cohort study aimed to enrol a minimum of 12 participants aged 11–18 yearswith CFS/ME attending the Royal United Hospitals Bath NHS Foundation Trust Specialist Paediatric CFS/ME Service, who were still symptomatic after 12 months or 12 sessions of standard treatment and were offered six to 12 sessions of ACT. Retention and recruitment data were analysed. Participants were asked to complete questionnaires before, during and after treatment. A selection of participants and their parents were interviewed about their experience of the study. Interviews were analysed using thematic analysis. RESULTS: 19 participants (95% of those approached) were recruited. Only 4 participants of this hard-to-reach group did not complete treatment. In almost all sessions participants reported that they felt ‘totally’ listened to in post session questionnaires (31/33 sessions). Preliminary interviews (n = 12) indicate acceptability of ACT, with all young people and their parents stating that they thought ACT should be offered to this population. Participants particularly commented that the absence of thought challenging (used in CBT-f) was a positive element of ACT. Participant's openness to try new approaches and altruistic desire to be in a study was noted. CONCLUSION: Recruitment data indicate that it is feasible to recruit and retain 11–18-year-olds with CFS/ME to a study offering ACT. Interviews with participants and parents were broadly positive suggesting ACT is an acceptable treatment in this population. Results indicated that it is both feasible and acceptable to offer ACT to 11–18-year-olds with CFS/ME using this protocol, supporting the prospect of an RCT in this area

Reduction in Drinking was Associated With Improved Clinical Outcomes in Women With HIV Infection and Unhealthy Alcohol Use: Results From a Randomized Clinical Trial of Oral Naltrexone Versus Placebo

Background Alcohol consumption is associated with poor health outcomes in women living with HIV (WLWH), but whether medication can help to reduce drinking in non–treatment‐seeking women or whether reduction in drinking improves HIV outcomes is unclear. We conducted a randomized clinical trial (RCT) of daily oral naltrexone (50 mg) versus placebo in WLWH who met criteria for current unhealthy alcohol use. Methods WLWH with current unhealthy alcohol use (\u3e7 drinks/wk or \u3e3 drinks/occasion) were randomly assigned to daily oral naltrexone 50 mg (n = 96) or placebo (n = 98) for 4 months. Drinking outcomes, including the proportion of women who reduced ( Results The participants’ mean age was 48 years, 86% were African American, and 94% were receiving HIV antiretroviral therapy. Among all participants, 89% and 85% completed the 4‐month and 7‐month follow‐ups, respectively. Participants in both groups substantially reduced drinking over time. At 1 and 3 months, naltrexone was associated with a greater reduction in drinking (p \u3c 0.05), but the proportion who reduced/quit drinking at 4 months (52% vs. 45%, p = 0.36) or 7 months (64% in both groups) was not different. HIV viral suppression at follow‐up was significantly better in participants who reduced/quit drinking versus those continuing unhealthy alcohol use at 4 months (72% vs. 53%, p = 0.02) and 7 months (74% vs. 54%, p = 0.02). Conclusions Participating in an RCT to reduce drinking was associated with significant drinking reduction regardless of medication assignment, suggesting that nonmedication aspects of research study participation (e.g., repeated assessments and support from research staff) could be important interventions to help reduce drinking outside of research studies. Drinking reduction was associated with improved HIV viral suppression, providing evidence to support recommendations to avoid unhealthy alcohol use among WLWH

Bringing greenhouse gas removal down to earth: Stakeholder supply chain appraisals reveal complex challenges

Greenhouse gas removal (GGR) approaches are considered essential in several projections to meet the climate mitigation ambition of the Paris Agreement. Biomass Energy with Carbon Capture and Storage (BECCS) and afforestation are included extensively in mitigation scenarios but there are concerns about the feasibility of these approaches. This was explored with stakeholders from industry, non-governmental organisations (NGOs) and policy who were involved in interviews and a one-day participatory workshop. Multicriteria mapping (MCM) methodology was used to appraise the ‘real-world’ feasibility of four specific greenhouse gas removal supply chains at a granular level in the UK context. The MCM analysis shows that afforestation performs better in comparison to three BECCS supply chains, on criteria such as business model, social acceptability, and environmental sustainability. This innovative application of the MCM methodology enables the abstract representations of GGR in integrated assessment models to be explored at a more granular level through a supply chain analysis and thus gain a deeper understanding of the issues facing these approaches. The data gathered allows a wide range of technical, environmental, social and political criteria to be systematically applied in appraising the practical performance of different future implementation options for afforestation and BECCS. If these GGR supply chains are to become a reality on the scale required for 1.5 °C global warming, factors such as global cooperation, land availability, and the longevity of policies and incentives were found to be major challenges

Investigating the New Landscapes of Welfare: Housing Policy, Politics and the Emerging Research Agenda

As debates about housing form an increasingly important arena of political controversy, much has been written about the new fissures that have appeared as governments not only struggle to reduce public expenditure deficits but also attempt to address problems such as affordability and homelessness. It is widely anticipated that new conflicts will be played out in the private rental market as access to homeownership becomes unrealistic and the supply of social housing diminishes. However, what other tensions might surface; that hitherto have not been subject to the critical gaze of housing research? In this paper, we provide some thoughts on the nascent policy issues as well as the ideological schisms that are likely to develop in coming years, offering suggestions as to how the focus of housing policy research might be reoriented towards a “politics” framework to capture and better understand the conflicts that are likely to arise

The effects of an additive on the release of potassium in biomass combustion

This study focuses on the effects of an aluminosilicate additive on the fate of potassium during biomass combustion. Such additives have shown some success in mitigating slagging and fouling problems in boilers and furnaces, and the mobility of potassium in combustion systems is one of the key factors dictating ash behaviour. To investigate this, a flame emission spectroscopy technique was used to evaluate the differences in the gas-phase potassium release profiles during the combustion of 5 mm diameter pellets of different biomass suspended in a methane-air flame. The biomass pellets were evaluated with various mixes of an aluminosilicate based additive (5, 15 and 25 wt%). Potassium emission detection, coupled with high speed video of the combustion process, indicated that potassium evolves over the three stages of volatile combustion (a sharp peak in the emission profile), char combustion (a broader peak) and “ash cooking” (a very broad peak over an extended period, long after the end of combustion). In the absence of additive, the three biomass studied (softwood, wheat straw, olive residue) behaved quite differently in terms of potassium release profiles. When the results are normalized for the amount of potassium in the fuel, it is clear that a large fraction of potassium enters the gas phase during the volatile and char combustion of the softwood. Olive residue, releases a lower fraction of potassium during the volatile and char combustion stages, indicating that more potassium is fixed in the ash. In contrast, wheat straw shows a release of potassium during combustion, and then, after a period of “ash cooking”, a substantial gradual release with continued exposure to hot combustion gases. The difference in the emission profiles can be interpreted in terms of the K:Cl ratios and the K:(Si+Al) ratios: high chlorine and/or low (Si+Al) facilitates the release of KCl or KOH to the gas phase, while high (Si+Al) helps to fix K in the solid phase. The addition of the aluminosilicate additive shows a clear reduction in the potassium released from all the biomass pellets, particularly during the char-oxidation and “ash cooking” stages, and the level of additive required is related to the amount of K in the biomass. The potassium emission experiments were complemented by laboratory-scale preparation of ash at different temperatures, and detection of residual potassium in the ash using Atomic Absorption Spectroscopy (AAS). These results validated the findings and quantified the higher fractions of potassium retained within the ash when additives are used. For the wood ash 70-100% of K is retained in the ash in the presence of additive; for the wheat straw, this figure is 60-80% and for the olive pellets it is 70-100%

"There's nothing”: unemployment, attitudes to work and punitive welfare reform in post-crash Salford

This article explores attitudes and barriers to work and the impact of punitive welfare reform in the city of Salford (Greater Manchester). Contextualising our discussion in relation to the contemporary landscape of inequality and social class in the UK, we draw attention to the trends towards the expansion of low paid work, precarity and stigmatisation, and highlight the need for more qualitative, geographically sensitive, studies of how these phenomena are being played out. Describing the economic context of the City of Salford and the current state of its labour market, we then present the findings from qualitative interviews with a sample of low income, mostly working-class participants, who describe their orientations towards employment, perceptions of the labour market, barriers to employment and interactions with punitive welfare reform. Ultimately, we conclude by noting that both strategies of neoliberal statecraft aimed at the reduction of the charitable state described by Wacquant are at play in Salford and that their result is a discouragement from claiming welfare and a recommodification of labour

Analysis of interactions between ribosomal proteins and RNA structural motifs

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>One important goal of structural bioinformatics is to recognize and predict the interactions between protein binding sites and RNA. Recently, a comprehensive analysis of ribosomal proteins and their interactions with rRNA has been done. Interesting results emerged from the comparison of r-proteins within the small subunit in <it>T. thermophilus </it>and <it>E. coli</it>, supporting the idea of a core made by both RNA and proteins, conserved by evolution. Recent work showed also that ribosomal RNA is modularly composed. Motifs are generally single-stranded sequences of consecutive nucleotides (ssRNA) with characteristic folding. The role of these motifs in protein-RNA interactions has been so far only sparsely investigated.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>This work explores the role of RNA structural motifs in the interaction of proteins with ribosomal RNA (rRNA). We analyze composition, local geometries and conformation of interface regions involving motifs such as tetraloops, kink turns and single extruded nucleotides. We construct an interaction map of protein binding sites that allows us to identify the common types of shared 3-D physicochemical binding patterns for tetraloops. Furthermore, we investigate the protein binding pockets that accommodate single extruded nucleotides either involved in kink-turns or in arbitrary RNA strands. This analysis reveals a new structural motif, called <it>tripod</it>.</p> <p>It corresponds to small pockets consisting of three aminoacids arranged at the vertices of an almost equilateral triangle. We developed a search procedure for the recognition of tripods, based on an empirical tripod fingerprint.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>A comparative analysis with the overall RNA surface and interfaces shows that contact surfaces involving RNA motifs have distinctive features that may be useful for the recognition and prediction of interactions.</p