Orientation effects support specialist processing of upright unfamiliar faces in children and adults

It is considerably harder to generalize identity across different pictures of unfamiliar faces, compared with familiar faces. This finding hints strongly at qualitatively distinct processing of unfamiliar face stimuli—for which we have less expertise. Yet, the extent to which face selective versus generic visual processes drive outcomes during this task has yet to be determined. To explore the relative contributions of each, we contrasted performance on a version of the popular Telling Faces Together unfamiliar face matching task, implemented in both upright and inverted orientations. Furthermore, we included different age groups (132 British children ages 6 to 11 years [69.7% White], plus 37 British White adults) to investigate how participants’ experience with faces as a category influences their selective utilization of specialized processes for unfamiliar faces. Results revealed that unfamiliar face matching is highly orientation-selective. Accuracy was higher for upright compared with inverted faces from 6 years of age, which is consistent with selective utilization of specialized processes for upright versus inverted unfamiliar faces during this task. The effect of stimulus orientation did not interact significantly with age, and there was no graded increase in the magnitude of inversion effects observed across childhood. Still, a numerically larger inversion effect in adults compared to children provides a degree of support for developmental changes in these specialized face abilities with increasing age/experience. Differences in the pattern of errors across age groups are also consistent with a qualitative shift in unfamiliar face processing that occurs some time after 11 years of ag

Hard Graft: Collaborative exploration of working class stories in shaping female educator identities

This empirical qualitative study investigates the ways in which working-class roots have shaped educator values and identity. Using collaborative autoethnography, we share an honest insight into the stories of seven female educators drawn together from a variety of health and social care disciplines. The five themes emerging from this research: Connection through differences and commonalities; graft; inner tensions; authenticity ‘I am who I am’ and the bigger picture are tightly interconnected, generating a complex and rich picture of contemporary female educator identity. This supportive and collaborative approach has been transformational in the realisation we are not alone, and it has provided a space to celebrate our ‘otherness’. As a result, we have embraced our collective responsibility to challenge inequalities and foster a more open, accessible and authentic HE future for all

The Debrisoft ® monofilament debridement pad for use in acute or chronic wounds: A NICE medical technology guidance

As part of its Medical Technology Evaluation Programme, the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) invited a manufacturer to provide clinical and economic evidence for the evaluation of the Debrisoft ® monofilament debridement pad for use in acute or chronic wounds. The University of Birmingham and Brunel University, acting as a consortium, was commissioned to act as an External Assessment Centre (EAC) for NICE, independently appraising the submission. This article is an overview of the original evidence submitted, the EAC’s findings and the final NICE guidance issued. The sponsor submitted a simple cost analysis to estimate the costs of using Debrisoft® to debride wounds compared with saline and gauze, hydrogel and larvae. Separate analyses were conducted for applications in home and applications in a clinic setting. The analysis took an UK National Health Service (NHS) perspective. It incorporated the costs of the technologies and supplementary technologies (such as dressings) and the costs of their application by a district nurse. The sponsor concluded that Debrisoft® was cost saving relative to the comparators. The EAC made amendments to the sponsor analysis to correct for errors and to reflect alternative assumptions. Debrisoft® remained cost saving in most analyses and savings ranged from £77 to £222 per patient compared with hydrogel, from £97 to £347 compared with saline and gauze, and from £180 to £484 compared with larvae depending on the assumptions included in the analysis and whether debridement took place in a home or clinic setting. All analyses were severely limited by the available data on effectiveness, in particular a lack of comparative studies and that the effectiveness data for the comparators came from studies reporting different clinical endpoints compared with Debrisoft®. The Medical Technologies Advisory Committee made a positive recommendation for adoption of Debrisoft® and this has been published as a NICE medical technology guidance (MTG17).The Birmingham and Brunel Consortium is funded by NICE to act as an External Assessment Centre for the Medical Technologies Evaluation Programme

Getting shot of elves: healing, witchcraft and fairies in the Scottish witchcraft trials

This paper re-examines the evidence of the Scottish witchcraft trials for beliefs associated by scholars with "elf-shot." Some supposed evidence for elf-shot is dismissed, but other material illuminates the interplay between illness, healing and fairy-lore in early modern Scotland, and the relationship of these beliefs to witchcraft itself

Materiality in the future of history: things, practices, and politics

Frank Trentmann is professor of history at Birkbeck College, University of London. From 2002 to 2007, he was director of the £5 million Cultures of Consumption research program, cofunded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council and the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC). He is working on a book for Penguin, The Consuming Passion: How Things Came to Seduce, Enrich, and Define Our Lives, from the Seventeenth Century to the Twenty‐First. This article is one of a pair seeking to facilitate greater exchange between history and the social sciences. Its twin—“Crossing Divides: Globalization and Consumption in History” (forthcoming in the Handbook of Globalization Studies, ed. Bryan Turner)—shows what social scientists (and contemporary historians) might learn from earlier histories. The piece here follows the flow in the other direction. Many thanks to the ESRC for grant number RES‐052‐27‐002 and, for their comments, to Heather Chappells, Steve Pincus, Elizabeth Shove, and the editor and the reviewer

Mature women and higher education: reconstructing identity and family relationships

Since Edwards’ influential study on mature women students and families in the 1990s, questions have been raised about the effects of Higher Education (HE) on family lives. Edwards maintained that relationships were at risk of breakdown due to the changing identity, increased self-esteem and enhanced confidence levels of women students. Men were perceived negatively as often being unsupportive of their wives’ return to HE, or threatened by the changes they observed in her. This paper is based on qualitative research methods focusing on whether HE changes a woman’s identity and reconstructs family relationships. A narrative line of inquiry was used to build detailed stories of a small group of women students and their husbands. The 11 women students were selected from one Foundation degree in Early Years programme at a further education institution. Data was constructed using mind mapping, focused interviews and a mosaic approach of participant-led research. Research findings showed that HE had the potential to transform a woman’s identity and position within her family relationships. The results also demonstrated that family capital, in the form of practical and emotional strategies of support from both husbands and children, played an instrumental part in the women’s success and participation in HE (though this aspect will be discussed in a subsequent paper)

C3d‐positive donor‐specific antibodies have a role in pretransplant risk stratification of cross‐match‐positive HLA‐incompatible renal transplantation : United Kingdom multicentre study

Anti‐HLA‐antibody characteristics aid to risk‐stratify patients and improve long‐term renal graft outcomes. Complement activation by donor‐specific antibody (DSA) is an important characteristic that may determine renal allograft outcome. There is heterogeneity in graft outcomes within the moderate to high immunological risk cases (cross‐match‐positive). We explored the role of C3d‐positive DSAs in sub‐stratification of cross‐match‐positive cases and relate to the graft outcomes. We investigated 139 cross‐match‐positive living‐donor renal transplant recipients from four transplant centres in the United Kingdom. C3d assay was performed on serum samples obtained at pretreatment (predesensitization) and Day 14 post‐transplant. C3d‐positive DSAs were found in 52 (37%) patients at pretreatment and in 37 (27%) patients at Day 14 post‐transplant. Median follow‐up of patients was 48 months (IQR 20.47–77.57). In the multivariable analysis, pretreatment C3d‐positive DSA was independently associated with reduced overall graft survival, the hazard ratio of 3.29 (95% CI 1.37–7.86). The relative risk of death‐censored five‐year graft failure was 2.83 (95% CI 1.56–5.13). Patients with both pretreatment and Day 14 C3d‐positive DSAs had the worst five‐year graft survival at 45.5% compared with 87.2% in both pretreatment and Day 14 C3d‐negative DSA patients with the relative risk of death‐censored five‐year graft failure was 4.26 (95% CI 1.79, 10.09). In this multicentre study, we have demonstrated for the first time the utility of C3d analysis as a distinctive biomarker to sub‐stratify the risk of poor graft outcome in cross‐match‐positive living‐donor renal transplantation

Review: A Publication of LMDA, the Literary Managers and Dramaturgs of the Americas, volume 17, issue 1

Contents include: Editor\u27s Page: A Note from New LMDA President, Brian Quirt; Think Dramaturgically, Act Locally! A Conference Overview; I Was Mugged at My First LMDA Conference; First-Timer Fragments; Conference Photos; Introducing the Lessing (and Joe and Michael); A Message Faxed from Romania; Acceptance Speech, Michael Lupu; Producing The Belle\u27s Stratagem; Dramaturging Justice: The Exonerated Project at the Alley Theatre; Past President Liz Engeleman: Some Appreciations; The Toronto Mini-Conference (reprinted from the LMDA Canada newsletter); Gateway to the Americas, The LMDA Delegation, A Report from Mexico; Imag[in]ing Poverty: Creative Critical Dramaturgy for Suzan-Lori Parks\u27s In the Blood; Hester, La Negrita in Iowa City, Staging Spells and Homelessness in Suzan-Lori Parks\u27s In the Blood; The Future of Theatre is...(a creative contest); Seventh Annual Call for LMDA Residency Proposals. Issue editors: D.J. Hopkins, Madeleine Oldham, Carlenne Lacostahttps://soundideas.pugetsound.edu/lmdareview/1034/thumbnail.jp

Developing priority variables ("ecosystem Essential Ocean Variables" — eEOVs) for observing dynamics and change in Southern Ocean ecosystems

Reliable statements about variability and change in marine ecosystems and their underlying causes are needed to report on their status and to guide management. Here we use the Framework on Ocean Observing (FOO) to begin developing ecosystem Essential Ocean Variables (eEOVs) for the Southern Ocean Observing System (SOOS). An eEOV is a defined biological or ecological quantity, which is derived from field observations, and which contributes significantly to assessments of Southern Ocean ecosystems. Here, assessments are concerned with estimating status and trends in ecosystem properties, attribution of trends to causes, and predicting future trajectories. eEOVs should be feasible to collect at appropriate spatial and temporal scales and are useful to the extent that they contribute to direct estimation of trends and/or attribution, and/or development of ecological (statistical or simulation) models to support assessments. In this paper we outline the rationale, including establishing a set of criteria, for selecting eEOVs for the SOOS and develop a list of candidate eEOVs for further evaluation. Other than habitat variables, nine types of eEOVs for Southern Ocean taxa are identified within three classes: state (magnitude, genetic/species, size spectrum), predator–prey (diet, foraging range), and autecology (phenology, reproductive rate, individual growth rate, detritus). Most candidates for the suite of Southern Ocean taxa relate to state or diet. Candidate autecological eEOVs have not been developed other than for marine mammals and birds. We consider some of the spatial and temporal issues that will influence the adoption and use of eEOVs in an observing system in the Southern Ocean, noting that existing operations and platforms potentially provide coverage of the four main sectors of the region — the East and West Pacific, Atlantic and Indian. Lastly, we discuss the importance of simulation modelling in helping with the design of the observing system in the long term. Regional boundary: south of 30°S

Implementation and Conduct of Therapeutic Hypothermia for Perinatal Asphyxial Encephalopathy in the UK – Analysis of National Data

BACKGROUND: Delay in implementing new treatments into clinical practice results in considerable health and economic opportunity costs. Data from the UK TOBY Cooling Register provides the opportunity to examine how one new effective therapy for newborn infants suspected of suffering asphyxial encephalopathy--therapeutic hypothermia- was implemented in the UK. METHODOLOGY/PRINCIPAL FINDINGS: We analysed returned data forms from inception of the Register in December 2006 to the end of July 2011. Data forms were received for 1384 (67%) of the 2069 infants registered. The monthly rate of notifications increased from median {IQR} 18 {15-31} to 33 {30-39} after the announcement of the results of the recent TOBY trial, and to 50 {36-55} after their publication. This rate further increased to 70 {64-83} following official endorsement of the therapy, and is now close to the expected numbers of eligible infants. Cooling was started at 3.3 {1.5-5.5} hours after birth and the time taken to achieve the target 33-34 °C rectal temperature was 1 {0-3} hours. The rectal temperature was in the target range in 83% of measurements. From 2006 to 2011 there was evidence of extension of treatment to slightly less severely affected infants. 278 of 1362 (20%) infants died at 2.9 {1.4-4.1} days of age. The rates of death fell slightly over the period of the Register and, at two years of age cerebral palsy was diagnosed in 22% of infants; half of these were spastic bilateral. Factors independently associated with adverse outcome were clinical seizures prior to cooling (p<0.001) and severely abnormal amplitude integrated EEG (p<0.001). CONCLUSIONS/SIGNIFICANCE: Therapeutic hypothermia was implemented appropriately within the UK, with significant benefit to patients and the health economy. This may be due in part to participation by neonatal units in clinical trials, the establishment of the national Register, and its endorsement by advisory bodies