Palm oil: Understanding barriers to sustainable consumption

Palm oil is relatively inexpensive, versatile, and popular, generating great economic value for Southeast Asian countries. However, the growing demand for palm oil is leading to deforestation and biodiversity loss. The current study is the first to employ a capability-opportunity-motivation (COM-B) framework in green consumerism, to determine which capability, opportunity, and motivation factors strongly predict the intentional purchasing of sustainable palm oil products by Australian consumers (N = 781). Exploratory factor analysis revealed four main types of predictors of SPO purchasing–Pro-Green Consumption Attitudes, Demotivating Beliefs, Knowledge and Awareness, and Perceived Product Availability. Multiple regression revealed that these four factors explained 50% of the variability in SPO purchasing behaviour, out of which Knowledge and Awareness accounted for 18% of the unique variance. Perceived Product Availability and Pro-Green Consumption Attitudes were also significant predictors but accounted for only 2% and 1% of unique variance, respectively. These results provide a valuable foundation for designing behaviour change interventions to increase consumer demand for sustainable palm oil products

Australian Youth Mental Health and Climate Change Concern After the Black Summer Bushfires

Climate change and its effects present notable challenges for mental health, particularly for vul-nerable populations, including young people. Immediately following the unprecedented Black Summer bushfire season of 2019/2020, 746 Australians (aged 16–25 years) completed measures of mental health and perceptions of climate change. Results indicated greater presentations of depression, anxiety, stress, adjustment disorder symptoms, substance abuse, and climate change distress and concern, as well as lower psychological resilience and perceived distance to climate change, in participants with direct exposure to these bushfires. Findings highlight significant vulnerabilities of concern for youth mental health as climate change advances

Whole Earth Telescope Observations of the Helium Interacting Binary PG 1346+082 (CR Bootis)

We present our analysis of 240 hr of white-light, high-speed photometry of the dwarf nova-like helium variable PG 1346+082 (CR Boo). We identify two frequencies in the low-state power spectrum, at 679.670 ± 0.004 μHz and 669.887 ± 0.008 μHz. The 679.670 μHz variation is coherent over at least a 2 week time span, the first demonstration of a phase-coherent photometric variation in any dwarf nova-like interacting binary white dwarf system. The high-state power spectrum contains a complex fundamental with a frequency similar, but not identical, to the low-state spectrum, and a series of harmonics not detected in low state. We also uncover an unexpected dependence of the high-frequency power\u27s amplitude and frequency structure on overall system magnitude. We discuss these findings in light of the general AM CVn system model, particularly the implications of the high-order harmonics on future studies of disk structure, mass transfer, and disk viscosity

Addressing climate change with behavioral science:A global intervention tournament in 63 countries

Effectively reducing climate change requires marked, global behavior change. However, it is unclear which strategies are most likely to motivate people to change their climate beliefs and behaviors. Here, we tested 11 expert-crowdsourced interventions on four climate mitigation outcomes: beliefs, policy support, information sharing intention, and an effortful tree-planting behavioral task. Across 59,440 participants from 63 countries, the interventions' effectiveness was small, largely limited to nonclimate skeptics, and differed across outcomes: Beliefs were strengthened mostly by decreasing psychological distance (by 2.3%), policy support by writing a letter to a future-generation member (2.6%), information sharing by negative emotion induction (12.1%), and no intervention increased the more effortful behavior-several interventions even reduced tree planting. Last, the effects of each intervention differed depending on people's initial climate beliefs. These findings suggest that the impact of behavioral climate interventions varies across audiences and target behaviors.</p

Addressing climate change with behavioral science: a global intervention tournament in 63 countries

Effectively reducing climate change requires marked, global behavior change. However, it is unclear which strategies are most likely to motivate people to change their climate beliefs and behaviors. Here, we tested 11 expert-crowdsourced interventions on four climate mitigation outcomes: beliefs, policy support, information sharing intention, and an effortful tree-planting behavioral task. Across 59,440 participants from 63 countries, the interventions’ effectiveness was small, largely limited to nonclimate skeptics, and differed across outcomes: Beliefs were strengthened mostly by decreasing psychological distance (by 2.3%), policy support by writing a letter to a future-generation member (2.6%), information sharing by negative emotion induction (12.1%), and no intervention increased the more effortful behavior—several interventions even reduced tree planting. Last, the effects of each intervention differed depending on people’s initial climate beliefs. These findings suggest that the impact of behavioral climate interventions varies across audiences and target behaviors

Addressing climate change with behavioral science:A global intervention tournament in 63 countries

Effectively reducing climate change requires marked, global behavior change. However, it is unclear which strategies are most likely to motivate people to change their climate beliefs and behaviors. Here, we tested 11 expert-crowdsourced interventions on four climate mitigation outcomes: beliefs, policy support, information sharing intention, and an effortful tree-planting behavioral task. Across 59,440 participants from 63 countries, the interventions' effectiveness was small, largely limited to nonclimate skeptics, and differed across outcomes: Beliefs were strengthened mostly by decreasing psychological distance (by 2.3%), policy support by writing a letter to a future-generation member (2.6%), information sharing by negative emotion induction (12.1%), and no intervention increased the more effortful behavior-several interventions even reduced tree planting. Last, the effects of each intervention differed depending on people's initial climate beliefs. These findings suggest that the impact of behavioral climate interventions varies across audiences and target behaviors.</p

Dimethyl fumarate in patients admitted to hospital with COVID-19 (RECOVERY): a randomised, controlled, open-label, platform trial

Dimethyl fumarate (DMF) inhibits inflammasome-mediated inflammation and has been proposed as a treatment for patients hospitalised with COVID-19. This randomised, controlled, open-label platform trial (Randomised Evaluation of COVID-19 Therapy [RECOVERY]), is assessing multiple treatments in patients hospitalised for COVID-19 (NCT04381936, ISRCTN50189673). In this assessment of DMF performed at 27 UK hospitals, adults were randomly allocated (1:1) to either usual standard of care alone or usual standard of care plus DMF. The primary outcome was clinical status on day 5 measured on a seven-point ordinal scale. Secondary outcomes were time to sustained improvement in clinical status, time to discharge, day 5 peripheral blood oxygenation, day 5 C-reactive protein, and improvement in day 10 clinical status. Between 2 March 2021 and 18 November 2021, 713 patients were enroled in the DMF evaluation, of whom 356 were randomly allocated to receive usual care plus DMF, and 357 to usual care alone. 95% of patients received corticosteroids as part of routine care. There was no evidence of a beneficial effect of DMF on clinical status at day 5 (common odds ratio of unfavourable outcome 1.12; 95% CI 0.86-1.47; p = 0.40). There was no significant effect of DMF on any secondary outcome

Dimethyl fumarate in patients admitted to hospital with COVID-19 (RECOVERY): a randomised, controlled, open-label, platform trial

Dimethyl fumarate (DMF) inhibits inflammasome-mediated inflammation and has been proposed as a treatment for patients hospitalised with COVID-19. This randomised, controlled, open-label platform trial (Randomised Evaluation of COVID-19 Therapy [RECOVERY]), is assessing multiple treatments in patients hospitalised for COVID-19 (NCT04381936, ISRCTN50189673). In this assessment of DMF performed at 27 UK hospitals, adults were randomly allocated (1:1) to either usual standard of care alone or usual standard of care plus DMF. The primary outcome was clinical status on day 5 measured on a seven-point ordinal scale. Secondary outcomes were time to sustained improvement in clinical status, time to discharge, day 5 peripheral blood oxygenation, day 5 C-reactive protein, and improvement in day 10 clinical status. Between 2 March 2021 and 18 November 2021, 713 patients were enroled in the DMF evaluation, of whom 356 were randomly allocated to receive usual care plus DMF, and 357 to usual care alone. 95% of patients received corticosteroids as part of routine care. There was no evidence of a beneficial effect of DMF on clinical status at day 5 (common odds ratio of unfavourable outcome 1.12; 95% CI 0.86-1.47; p = 0.40). There was no significant effect of DMF on any secondary outcome

A community-based social marketing intervention to reduce wood smoke pollution: Key findings from the Armidale Wood Smoke Reduction Project

Wood smoke pollution is a serious health issue. Winter levels of air pollution in Armidale regularly exceed the national standard for airborne particulate matter (PM 2.5). Most of these winter emissions come from wood burning heaters, the main source of heat for about one third of all households in the city. A community-based social marketing (CBSM) campaign comprising an "education" component about negative health effects of wood smoke pollution and wood heater operation and firewood management practices, along with workshops, regular media stories and public displays on wood heating was delivered during winter 2010. Two hundred and fifty three respondents (Mean age = 48.98, SD = 21.57, 54% females) completed a survey assessing health risk perceptions, wood heater operation and firewood management practices prior to the CBSM intervention. Of which 138 respondents completed the post-intervention survey. A series of paired samples t-tests revealed that respondents' health risk perceptions, wood heater operation practices, and firewood management significantly improved at post-test. A supplementary 3 (Month: July-Sept) by 3 (Year: 2008-2010) ANCOVA (controlling for weather variables) was conducted to determine whether these changes in perceptions and practice resulted in a corresponding improvement in Armidale's air quality (assessed by PM 2.5 levels) during the CBSM intervention period. Contrary to prediction, the significant Month effect indicated that PM 2.5 levels significantly decreased from July to August, but not from August to September, and the significant Year effect indicated a significant increase in PM 2.5 levels during winter in 2010. Results suggested that an increase in public recognition of the health risks and practices did not translate into a reduction in overall air pollution levels. One explanation is that with the rising electricity prices in New England region, wood heaters use also increased, thus offsetting any potential positive effects associated with the CBSM intervention. Overall the present findings offer strategies to increase public awareness about wood smoke pollution and responsible wood heater use and firewood management practices