Circles of Support and Accountability (CoSAs): Their use and development for young people with learning disabilities who exhibit sexually harmful behaviour in England

A Circle of Support and Accountability (CoSA) is an offender support model associated with high risk adult sex offenders after release from prison. It works by establishing a supportive social network of community volunteers who assist the ex-offender (core member) with reintegration and his/her ongoing risk responsibilities. This thesis critically explores the application of this model to a small group of young/adolescent men with learning disabilities who were assessed as posing a risk of exhibiting sexually harmful behaviour. Focus groups, interviews and case record data were gathered between January, 2013 and December 2015 to establish four qualitative case studies. Data was explored by considering how the model was adapted for young people with learning disabilities, the tensions between the dual aims of support and accountability and the viability of managing the risk of a group of vulnerable individuals. These questions were examined using theories of offender risk management, restorative justice, rehabilitation, social networks and community treatment programmes. The study explores the experiences of participants of the CoSA. Whilst social support was shown to be a strong and adaptive tool, accountability and risk management proved confusing and confrontational. The CoSAs in this study remained associated with high risk sex offenders and were troubled with problems of labelling and stigma. These findings question whether the existing model can and should be used with such vulnerable individuals. The thesis concludes by arguing that any programme for young people with learning disabilities who exhibit sexually harmful behaviour should be socially driven and welfare orientated and not a managerial, criminal justice solution determined by risk. Keywords: CoSA, Sex Offending, Learning Disability, Young People, Risk Management, Restorative Justice, Rehabilitation, Social Networks, Accountability

Rural putsch: power, class, social relations and change in the English rural village

The paper uses ethnography to discuss a political putsch – a move from Old Guard to newcomer dominance – in an English rural village. Applying the conceptual ideas of Goffman on symbols of class status and Thrift (2012) on space and an expressive infrastructure, it responds to Shucksmith's (2012) call for research into the micro workings and consequences of class power in rural contexts. The analysis stresses the relevance of 'sticky' space (the residue of past social relations shaping the present, the dwindling amenities and a contemporary absence of pavements) and a contemporary blurring of rural and the urban identities (Norfolk/ London). Moreover, both Goffman's restrictive devices and class symbols (who garners support and who does not) and the temporal dimension of an expressive infrastructure (informing individual dispositions and orientations – class affect) now construct rural spaces. The paper therefore retains a flavour of sociology's obstinate interest in geographic milieu, but the stage is now one of a global countryside both influencing and influenced by local politics and elites. A global recession and the rural penalty, whereby rural residents' experience is more acute, has meant that not all spaces or agents are equal and some are therefore better placed to adapt, accommodate or resist change (Shucksmith 2012). In a climate of various rural crises (fracking in the 'desolate' North of England and the contentious culling of badgers), this paper uses ethnography to study the operation of rural micro-politics and by doing so highlight the value of an ethnographic approach for sociology for understanding the local in the global

From tomorrow to today: The Canadian Council of Ministers of the Environment and Canadian environmental policy.

The Canadian Council of Ministers of the Environment, the CCME, is an intergovernmental organization devoted to promoting the harmonization of federal-provincial environmental policies and regulations. The CCME is one of many institutional responses to the growing public concern over the environment. The importance of the CCME in the Canadian environmental policy community has risen and fallen in parallel with the importance of the environment as a public policy agenda issue. The CCME, after a decline in the 1970\u27s, experienced a renaissance in importance after 1988. Since then, the Council has been involved in many environmental policy initiatives ranging from the management of waste to harmonizing environmental assessment regimes. Many CCME initiatives, however, have been heavily influenced by an institutional tendency to place a strong prerequisite on intergovernmental cooperation. Maintaining collegial and cooperative relations has, on occasion, impeded the CCME\u27s other objective of promoting sustainable development across Canada. In some cases, the CCME has either ignored or limited its action in certain spheres of environmental policy. In other cases, CCME policies have produced strictly voluntary sets of guidelines and codes of practice; guidelines that are usually unenforceable and infrequently monitored. In retrospect, the success of the CCME is still debateable. The CCME, overall, is still unequipped to prevent the general retreat of government from important sustainable development principles. While the importance of the CCME as an actor in the Canadian environmental policy community seems assured for the time being, and is likely to be expanded, the furthering of many sustainable development and environmental protection policies is much less certain.Dept. of History, Philosophy, and Political Science. Paper copy at Leddy Library: Theses & Major Papers - Basement, West Bldg. / Call Number: Thesis1995 .H545. Source: Masters Abstracts International, Volume: 34-02, page: 0590. Adviser: Trevor Price. Thesis (M.A.)--University of Windsor (Canada), 1995

Selective attention and the auditory vertex potential. 2: Effects of signal intensity and masking noise

A randomized sequence of tone bursts was delivered to subjects at short inter-stimulus intervals with the tones originating from one of three spatially and frequency specific channels. The subject's task was to count the tones in one of the three channels at a time, ignoring the other two, and press a button after each tenth tone. In different conditions, tones were given at high and low intensities and with or without a background white noise to mask the tones. The N sub 1 component of the auditory vertex potential was found to be larger in response to attended channel tones in relation to unattended tones. This selective enhancement of N sub 1 was minimal for loud tones presented without noise and increased markedly for the lower tone intensity and in noise added conditions

Selective attention and the auditory vertex potential. 1: Effects of stimulus delivery rate

Enhancement of the auditory vertex potentials with selective attention to dichotically presented tone pips was found to be critically sensitive to the range of inter-stimulus intervals in use. Only at the shortest intervals was a clear-cut enhancement of the latency component to stimuli observed for the attended ear

Vertex evoked potentials in a rating-scale detection task: Relation to signal probability

Vertex evoked potentials were recorded from human subjects performing in an auditory detection task with rating scale responses. Three values of a priori probability of signal presentation were tested. The amplitudes of the N1 and P3 components of the vertex potential associated with correct detections of the signal were found to be systematically related to the strictness of the response criterion and independent of variations in a priori signal probability. No similar evoked potential components were found associated with signal absent judgements (misses and correct rejections) regardless of the confidence level of the judgement or signal probability. These results strongly support the contention that the form of the vertex evoked response is closely correlated with the subject's psychophysical decision regarding the presence or absence of a threshold level signal

Hearing studies in old mice: The effect of pre-pulse inhibition on the acoustic startle response

The purpose of this study pertains to hearing in the species Peromyscus maniculatus (deer mice) — specifically their responses to a startling sound. Approximately seven mice were tested between four and five years of age, approaching the lifespan of this species. By means of an accelerometer, which measures a reflexive, motor response, the mice were presented with an acoustic startle-eliciting stimulus (SES) — that is a loud, startling, unexpected sound. During the study, the mice were also presented with a softer, less-intense stimulus — known as a pre-pulse — slightly before the more intense sound. This pre-pulse stimulus was in the form of auditory, somatosensory, or a combined input. The study aimed to quantitatively measure whether the pre-pulse stimuli would elicit a diminished reflexive response (pre-pulse inhibition) to the SES

A study of the reporting of patient and public involvement and engagement (PPIE) in orthodontic research

Introduction: Patient and public involvement and engagement (PPIE) in research is an essential component of high-quality research. Patients and the public can identify which research topics are most relevant to them, contribute to study design, and interpretation and dissemination of findings. While inclusion of PPIE is widely adopted in medical research, awareness within the dental research community is more limited. Aim: To examine patient and public involvement and engagement in orthodontic research activity. Design: Identification and appraisal of use of PPIE in orthodontic research reporting and funding applications using a systematic approach. Methods: Three sources of information were examined: (1) research articles published between September 2018 and September 2019 in four major orthodontic journals. Articles were examined for reported PPIE; (2) common funding bodies for orthodontic research were assessed to establish whether PPIE was mandated (National Institute for Health Research, Medical Research Council, Wellcome Trust, Chief Scientist Office (Scotland), Health and Care Research Wales, British Orthodontic Society Foundation, Royal College of Surgeons and CLEFT); and (3) publication guidance for authors in these journals was examined to identify whether reporting of PPIE was included. Results: Of the 363 research articles, 2 (0.6%) mention patient/public involvement. None of the 363 research articles mention patient/public engagement. Of nine funding bodies, 2 (22%) request evidence of patient/public involvement as a condition of receiving funding with one (11%) expecting evidence of public engagement to be provided as a condition of receiving funding. None of the four major orthodontic journals include patient/public involvement and/or engagement in their guidance for authors. Conclusion: There is currently: (1) a notable lack of reporting of PPIE in orthodontic research; (2) variability in the requirements of funding bodies for researchers to include PPIE in funding applications and throughout the research process; and (3) no stipulation in journals’ instructions for authors

Biochemical markers in bronchial carcinoma.

A total of 107 patients with bronchial carcinoma have been studied for the presence of potential circulating tumour markers which might be used as indicators of recurrence after primary treatment. Plasma carcinoembryonic antigen (CEA) levels were estimated in every patient and, after a preliminary hormone screening study, plasma calcitonin (CT) and parathyroid hormone (PTH) levels were assayed in 66 patients. Oat-cell tumours proved to be of particular interest in that CEA levels greater than 40 microgram/l were measured (initially or subsequently) in 40.6 percent and CT levels were elevated in 75 percent. Longitudinal studies point towards the possible use of elevated marker levels as guides to therapy when all other features of recurrent disease are lacking. It is clear that no ideal tumour marker exists for bronchial carcinoma but in an individual case an abnormal level of one or more marker substances may provide a valuable aid to treatment

Surviving the cold: molecular analyses of insect cryoprotective dehydration in the Arctic springtail Megaphorura arctica (Tullberg)

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Insects provide tractable models for enhancing our understanding of the physiological and cellular processes that enable survival at extreme low temperatures. They possess three main strategies to survive the cold: freeze tolerance, freeze avoidance or cryoprotective dehydration, of which the latter method is exploited by our model species, the Arctic springtail <it>Megaphorura arctica</it>, formerly <it>Onychiurus arcticus </it>(Tullberg 1876). The physiological mechanisms underlying cryoprotective dehydration have been well characterised in <it>M. arctica </it>and to date this process has been described in only a few other species: the Antarctic nematode <it>Panagrolaimus davidi</it>, an enchytraied worm, the larvae of the Antarctic midge <it>Belgica antarctica </it>and the cocoons of the earthworm <it>Dendrobaena octaedra</it>. There are no in-depth molecular studies on the underlying cold survival mechanisms in any species.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>A cDNA microarray was generated using 6,912 <it>M. arctica </it>clones printed in duplicate. Analysis of clones up-regulated during dehydration procedures (using both cold- and salt-induced dehydration) has identified a number of significant cellular processes, namely the production and mobilisation of trehalose, protection of cellular systems via small heat shock proteins and tissue/cellular remodelling during the dehydration process. Energy production, initiation of protein translation and cell division, plus potential tissue repair processes dominate genes identified during recovery. Heat map analysis identified a duplication of the trehalose-6-phosphate synthase (TPS) gene in <it>M. arctica </it>and also 53 clones co-regulated with TPS, including a number of membrane associated and cell signalling proteins. Q-PCR on selected candidate genes has also contributed to our understanding with glutathione-S-transferase identified as the major antioxdidant enzyme protecting the cells during these stressful procedures, and a number of protein kinase signalling molecules involved in recovery.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>Microarray analysis has proved to be a powerful technique for understanding the processes and genes involved in cryoprotective dehydration, beyond the few candidate genes identified in the current literature. Dehydration is associated with the mobilisation of trehalose, cell protection and tissue remodelling. Energy production, leading to protein production, and cell division characterise the recovery process. Novel membrane proteins, along with aquaporins and desaturases, have been identified as promising candidates for future functional analyses to better understand membrane remodelling during cellular dehydration.</p