Special care units: Recreational activities for patients with Alzheimer\u27s disease

The purpose of this study was to evaluate the recreational activities provided in special care units located in the Inland Empire. The population that this study sought to assist was patients diagnosed with Alzheimer\u27s disease and living in an Alzheimer\u27s special care unit

Peer to Peer Sustainability Outreach Programs: the Interface of Education and Behavior Change

The current climate change crisis demands immediate and creative approaches for systemic shifts in our culture and actions. In the past several decades, education has played a role in bringing awareness regarding environmental issues, but has not necessarily resulted in all the needed behavior changes. A newer approach combines psychological theories with outreach and marketing techniques. This is the rationale behind a new kind of campus activism, peer to peer sustainability outreach programs – the subject of this research. This dissertation research aims to identify current peer to peer sustainability outreach programs and their operations; develop process and outcome evaluation protocols for the programs; clarify administrative procedures and their relationship to a program‘s success; and gain an understanding of how these programs contribute to the growing field of sustainability education and related human behavior change. Methods used include: case studies, peer surveys, interviews and focus groups, and program record analysis. These studies found that programs across the U.S. employ a variety of organizational models and delivery methods that are best suited to individual campuses‘ needs and resources with common motivations and desires for assessment techniques. An in-depth evaluation of one program found strong educational and cultural impacts, positive ecological and financial impacts, with a need for broadened outreach approaches and feedback loops. Combining findings and literature from social psychology, peer education, and program evaluation, this research concludes by identifying elements of successful and effective programs

Sustaining and Strengthening a Macro Identity: The Association of Macro Practice Social Work

Macro practice focuses on community-level interventions, such as management, organizing, research, and policy advocacy. Despite social work’s deep roots in this type of work, macro practice and macro practitioners often practice without support or connections with other macro practitioners, and are underrepresented in the profession. In 2006, a group of social workers, including academics and practitioners, formed the Association of Macro Practice Social Work (AMPSW). AMPSW works to strengthen the professional identity of macro practitioners, elevate the status of macro social workers, and address common concerns within the social work profession

Collusion, crime, and the death of downtown : a study of firm relocation in Johannesburg, South Africa

Thesis (M.C.P. in International Development and Regional Planning)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Urban Studies and Planning, 2003.Includes bibliographical references (leaves 125-130).This study explores the dynamics of firm relocation in Johannesburg, South Africa, by analyzing the mass exodus of firms out of the city's Central Business District (CBD) over the past two decades. Using a historical approach, this study examines the interplay between urban form and firm behavior. We typically understand urban form to be a function of firm behavior-that is, firms choose their locations and thus dictate which areas are developed. This study finds that the inverse is true. Firm behavior is a function of urban form. Firms are location-takers. Forces endogenous to the urban form act on firms to determine which areas of a city are favorable for firm location. The following chapters probe the way changes in the Johannesburg CBD's form, itself a function of political, economic, and social transition, push individual firms to disperse to new locales throughout the city. Exogenous factors like crime, state failure, and skewed property markets biased firms against the CBD as a viable location. Their predominance in the range of factors that affect firm behavior suggests that a focus on extra-firm institutions (rather than the firms themselves) more adequately explains the relationship between firm behavior and urban forms.by Christine Erickson.M.C.P.in International Development and Regional Plannin

Gratitude for Better or Worse: Differential Predictors and Affective Outcomes of State Gratitude in Positive and Negative Contexts

Whereas past studies primarily examined state-level gratitude measured across long periods of time and in the context of positive events, this study assessed situational predictors of state gratitude and its affective outcomes in the context of specific positive and negative naturalistic events. Across seven weeks, 147 undergraduates recorded best and worst weekly events, depressive symptoms, as well as gratitude and positive affect (PA) anchored to those events. Independent raters coded events as dependent or independent of participants’ agency and interpersonal or noninterpersonal. Multilevel models showed there was a significant interaction between agency and interpersonal status for positive events, and simple effects tests indicated participants reported higher levels of gratitude for independent-interpersonal events compared to other potential event types. Unexpectedly, participants also reported higher gratitude for dependent events if they were interpersonal in nature. Negative event-anchored state gratitude was also higher for interpersonal events as indicated by a significant main effect. Lastly, within-person variability in event-anchored state gratitude was associated with higher state PA following both best and worst events, but only state gratitude anchored to best events was related to lower weekly depressive symptoms. Overall, results demonstrated that naturally occurring state gratitude for specific events was differentially impacted by situational factors, and that within-person variability in gratitude following both positive and negative events is related to positive affective outcomes

Traditional Open-bay Versus Single-family Room Neonatal Intensive Care Unit: a Comparison of Selected nutrition Outcomes

Background: In contrast to the traditional open-bay–type design of the neonatal intensive care unit (tNICU), infants in developmentally appropriate NICU (dNICU) are housed in individual rooms with greater control of light and noise. Previous reports have documented positive influence of the dNICU in cardiorespiratory status, physiologic stability, and weight gain of the infants. The objective of this study was to explore selected nutrition outcomes of infants in the dNICU versus tNICU. Method: A prospective cohort study was conducted on infants with birth weight of 1500 g or less cared for in dNICU (n = 42) or tNICU (n = 31). Differences between days to reach full parenteral nutrition, full enteral nutrition, or full bottling were determined using analysis of covariance controlling for gestational age, birth weight, and clinical risk index for babies (CRIB) acuity score. Results: There were no differences between the two groups in days to reach full parenteral and bottle feeding. The infants in the dNICU took fewer days to reach full enteral nutrition (20.8 days, 95% confidence intervals [CI]: 17, 24.6 (dNICU) vs 23.3 days, 95% CI: 17.1, 29.6 (tNICU), P = 0.04) than those in the tNICU. Conclusions: Although the two groups of infants only differed in the days to reach full enteral feeding, it is important to remember that the lack of difference may be clinically significant. Clinically, the infants in the dNICU were younger (gestational age) and sicker (CRIB acuity score) than the infants in the tNICU. Consequently, the results of this study support the change to dNICU, as the private room model provides a supportive environment for growth as evidenced by similar nutritional outcome measures. More research is needed to determine the effect of the dNICU on nutrition outcomes

Impact of Manure Application on Phosphorus in Surface Runoff and Soil Erosion

Effects of method of manure management and dietary P were compared on 21 natural runoff plots to monitor the long-term impact of dietary P to P losses in runoff and erosion. Reducing feed P resulted in a 33% reduction in manure P content and soil test P buildup and runoff losses of P also were directly proportional to feed P inputs. The timing and management of manure are also important considerations for controlling P losses in runoff in the year of application. However, residual effects of timing and management are probably small. Management criteria designed to assess the potential for landscape P-loading (i.e. “P-index”) correctly weight winter applications as more detrimental than planting time applications

Engagement takes a (fishing) village to manage a resource:Principles and practice of effective stakeholder engagement

Highlights • Qualitative study of stakeholder engagement strategies used in natural resource management. • We identify 22 outreach strategies, how they help practitioners achieve nine management goals, and how they can be measured using five metrics. • Inclusive and transparent engagement is critical for creating and implementing legitimate, salient, and credible policy