Transnational dimensions to environmental resource dynamics: modes of governance and local resource management in Eastern DRC

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'MMR talk' and vaccination choices: an ethnographic study in Brighton

In the context of the high-profile controversy that has unfolded in the UK around the measles, mumps and rubella (MMR) vaccine and its possible adverse effects, this paper explores how parents in Brighton, southern England, are thinking about MMR for their own children. Research focusing on parents’ engagement with MMR has been dominated by analysis of the proximate influences on their choices, and in particular scientific and media information, which have led health policy to focus on information and education campaigns. This paper reports ethnographic work including narratives by mothers in Brighton.Our work questions such reasoning in showing how wider personal and social issues shape parents’ immunisation actions. The narratives by mothers show how practices around MMR are shaped by personal histories, by birth experiences and related feelings of control, by family health histories, by their readings of their child’s health and particular strengths and vulnerabilities, by particular engagements with health services,by processes building or undermining confidence,and by friendships and conversations with others,which are themselves shaped by wider social differences and transformations. Although many see vaccination as a personal decision which must respond to the particularities of a child’s immune system, ‘MMR talk’, which affirms these conceptualisations, has become a social phenomenon in itself. These perspectives suggest ways in which people’s engagements with MMR reflect wider changes in their relations with science and the state

Technology, inclusivity and the rogue: bats and the war against the ‘invisible enemy’

Although tempting to envisage the emerging violence in conservation as either against nature or in defence of it, this paper argues that such violence is increasingly between ‘the included’ and ‘rogues’ in ways that transcend the nature : society binary. The paper traces how the emergence of these battle lines is associated with the digital information revolution that is producing discourses and practices of ‘inclusion’ that embrace social and natural worlds, whilst recasting a hitherto knowable and governable ‘excluded’ as more unknowable and threatening ‘rogues’. Accordingly, the paper then illustrates how the battle against the ‘invisible enemy’ of Ebola was fought not just against rogue viruses but against rogue bats, rogue deforesters and rogue patients, transcending the nature : human binary, and similarly that sustainable solutions are being sought in rearranging landscapes within an inclusive ‘One Health’ approach

Perceived stress in university students studying in a further education college

Previous research investigating perceived stress and mental health in UK University students have used a sample population from Higher Education Institutes (HEIs), and to the authors’ knowledge, there is no literature specifically examining stress in a student population within a higher education-in-further education environment (HE-in-FE). The aim of the current study was to address this gap in the literature by investigating the perceived stress of HE-in-FE students. 94 participants (age = 28.7 ± 9.6 years) completed the perceived stress scale (PSS-10) with a mean score of 17.9 (± 7.2). The unidimensional measure was correlated with various demographical characteristics including age, sex, employment, self-directed study time, and time spent caring for others (e.g. children). Findings are comparable to investigations that have previously used students at HEIs, it can be suggested that despite the different context in which HE-in-FE students complete their HE study, and the ‘untraditional’ demographic from which they come, levels of perceived stress appear to be comparable to the ‘traditional’ undergraduate. Further analysis revealed significantly greater perceived stress in female students and it is recommended that future work employs a mixed methods approach to further examine the implications and possible reasons for this

A Case Study of Using Mobile Applications and Peripherals to Encourage “Real-Life” Critical Analysis in Human Physiology

This paper shares a practice of encouraging critical analysis in science students by comparing mobile applications and peripherals to traditional tools to record physiological variables such as heart rate and blood pressure. A progressive series of case studies is described with learning outcomes mapped to the benchmark statement for Bioscience from the United Kingdom's Quality Assurance Agency. A student reflection and staff commentary of the practice is also offered

Comparison of social resistance to Ebola response in Sierra Leone and Guinea suggests explanations lie in political configurations not culture

Sierra Leone and Guinea share broadly similar cultural worlds, straddling the societies of the Upper Guinea Coast with Islamic West Africa. There was, however, a notable difference in their reactions to the Ebola epidemic. As the epidemic spread in Guinea, acts of violent or everyday resistance to outbreak control measures repeatedly followed, undermining public health attempts to contain the crisis. In Sierra Leone, defiant resistance was rarer. Instead of looking to ‘culture’ to explain patterns of social resistance (as was common in the media and in the discourse of responding public health authorities) a comparison between Sierra Leone and Guinea suggests that explanations lie in divergent political practice and lived experiences of the state. In particular, the structures of authority in which the government-sanctioned epidemic response was channeled relate very differently to communities of trust in each country. Predicting and addressing social responses to epidemic control measures should assess such political-trust configurations when planning interventions

ACLAS – a method to define geologically significant lineaments from potential fields data

Geological features, such as faults, dikes and contacts appear as lineaments in gravity and magnetic data. The Automated Coherent Lineament Analysis and Selection (ACLAS) method is a new approach to automatically compare and combine sets of lineaments or edges derived from two or more existing enhancement techniques applied to the same gravity or magnetic data set. ACLAS can be applied to the results of any edge detection algorithms and overcomes discrepancies between techniques to generate a coherent set of detected lineaments, which can be more reliably incorporated into geological interpretation. We demonstrate that the method increases spatial accuracy, removes artefacts not related to real edges, increases stability and that it is fast to implement and execute. The direction of lower density or susceptibility can also be automatically determined representing, for example, the downthrown side of a fault. Here, ACLAS is demonstrated on magnetic anomalies calculated from a simple slab model and from a synthetic continental margin model with noise added to the result. The approach helps to identify and discount artefacts of the different techniques, although the success of the combination is limited by the appropriateness of the individual techniques and their inherent assumptions. ACLAS has been applied separately to gravity and magnetic data from the NW Australia shelf displaying results from the two data sets together helps the appreciation of similarities and differences between gravity and magnetic results and indicates the application of the new approach to large scale structural mapping. Future developments could include refinement of depth estimates for ACLAS lineaments

Termites, mud daubers and their earths: a multispecies approach to fertility and power in West Africa

The termites and mud-dauber wasps of West Africa build earthen structures in which their eggs and larvae develop. This paper examines how these insect earths are understood and used in West Africa, focusing on their direct consumption (geophagy) and medicinal qualities. Existing research reveals these earths to be enriched in minerals otherwise lacking in the diets of the region, and suggests that insects may also introduce anti-microbial properties into them. The paper examines the place of these earths in the lives of those who use them and through a 'multispecies' approach provides new insights into the ecological dimensions to 'religious' thought and practice, and of the respect that these insects command