Fired and pregnant: gender differences in job flexibility outcomes after job loss

We study whether women and men cope with job loss differently, focusing on the importance of workers’ job flexibility and household setting. Our empirical analysis is based on Dutch administrative monthly micro data over the period 2006-2017 using a quasi-experimental design involving job loss following firm bankruptcy. We find for displaced women, but not for displaced men, a persistence in job flexibilities involving limited working hours and short commutes. Importantly, job loss results in a smaller loss in hourly wages and longer unemployment for women, narrowing the gender wage gap but widening the gender employment gap. Also, we show that female workers who are pregnant when job loss occurs experience large losses in employment and conditional on re-employment take up a flexible job. Policy advice is to put a safety net in place to protect pregnant women against the long-term consequences of job loss

Agglomeration Economies and the Urban Wage Premium in Australia

This paper is the first to quantify the economic impact of urban density in Australia on individual wages, referred to as the urban wage premium. By combining Household Income and Labour Dynamics in Australia Survey microdata on 13,112 employed individuals and regional-level population data, population density effects on individual hourly wages are studied over the period 2001 to 2019. A unique feature of this paper is to apply a flow-based clustering algorithm that uses commuting flows to define spatial aggregations. The urban wage premium is estimated conditional on the specific aggregation. The Ordinary Least Squares estimate of the urban wage premium peaks at 2.7 per cent. Controlling for individual fixed effects, the estimate peaks at 1.6 per cent. This evidence suggests that wages increase by 1.6 per cent to 2.7 per cent if local density doubles.Hervorming Sociale Regelgevin

Cloaking via anomalous localized resonance for doubly complementary media in the quasistatic regime

This paper is devoted to the study of cloaking via anomalous localized resonance (CALR) in the two- and three-dimensional quasistatic regimes. CALR associated with negative index materials was discovered by Milton and Nicorovici [21] for constant plasmonic structures in the two- dimensional quasistatic regime. Two key features of this phenomenon are the localized resonance, i.e., the fields blow up in some regions and remain bounded in some others, and the connection between the localized resonance and the blow up of the power of the fields as the loss of the material goes to 0. An important class of negative index materials for which the localized resonance might appear is the class of reflecting complementary media introduced in [24]. It was shown in [29] that the complementarity property is not enough to ensure a connection between the blow up of the power and the localized resonance. In this paper, we study CALR for a subclass of complementary media called doubly complementary media. This class is rich enough to allow us to cloak an arbitrary source concentrating on an arbitrary smooth bounded manifold of codimension 1 placed in an arbitrary medium via anomalous localized resonance; the cloak is independent of the source. The following three properties are established for doubly complementary media: P1. CALR appears if and only if the power blows up; P2. The power blows up if the source is located "near" the plasmonic structure; P3. The power remains bounded if the source is far away from the plasmonic structure. Property P2, the blow up of the power, is in fact established for reflecting complementary media. The proofs are based on several new observations and ideas. One of the difficulties is to handle the localized resonance. To this end, we extend the reflecting and removing localized singularity techniques introduced in [24-26], and implement the separation of variables for Cauchy problems for a general shell. The results in this paper are inspired by and imply recent ones of Ammari et al. [3] and Kohn et al. [16] in two dimensions and extend theirs to general non-radial core-shell structures in both two and three dimensions

Gevolgen van baanverlies tijdens de zwangerschap houden lang aan

Hervorming Sociale Regelgevin

Exergames for falls prevention in sheltered homes:A feasibility study

Introduction:Falls prevention is a global priority given its substantial impact on older adults and cost to healthcare systems. Advances in telerehabilitation technology such as `exergaming’ show potential for delivering accessible, engaging exercise programs for older adults. This study aimed to establish the feasibility, acceptability and usability of exergaming in sheltered housing.Methods: A mixed-methods study with participants randomised in 2 sheltered housing facilities to intervention (n = 1 home, 12 participants) and control (n = 1 home 2, 12 participants) provided usual care for all, (physiotherapy prescribed strength and balance exercises and falls prevention advice) and a 6-week supervised exergaming programme (MIRA) offered 3 times per week to the intervention group only. At 6 weeks, feasibility, usability and acceptability outcomes were collected and analysed using descriptive statistics; qualitative focus groups with participants and interviews with staff were also completed and thematically analysed to elicit barriers and facilitators to usability and acceptability.Results: Mean exercise per week increased from 10.6 to 14.1 minutes in the control group and 9.6 to 36.8 minutes in the intervention group. All study processes and measures appeared feasible; 72% of those invited consented to taking part and 92% completed 6-week follow-up. Individual domains for the System Usability Scores (SUS) showed participants felt veryconfident’usingthesystemwith⊃port(70%),wod−’sinℎℎ⊃or(70%),̲like to use exergames frequently’ (50%) and found the system easy→use’(90%).However,theyalsofe&lt;they→’(90%).,ℎ&lt;ℎneeded to learn a lot at the beginning’ (40%) and would `need technical support’ (70%) for independent use of the exergames. Mean overall SUS was 63 reflecting moderate usability for independent use. Qualitative data indicated exergames were well received and highlighted motivational and social aspects; costs and set up. Staff also felt exergaming complemented traditional care.Discussion: Our study contributes to the evidence guiding the use of exergames to deliver suitable falls prevention interventions for older adults within sheltered housing in community settings.<br/

Solvates, salts, and cocrystals : a proposal for a feasible classification system

The design of pharmaceutical cocrystals has initiated widespread debate on the classification of cocrystals. Current attempts to classify multicomponent crystals suffer from ambiguity, which has led to inconsistent definitions for cocrystals and for multicomponent crystals in general. Inspired by the work of Aitipamula et al. (Cryst. Growth Des. 2012, 12, 2147-2152), we present a feasible classification system for all multicomponent crystals. The present classification enables us to analyze and classify multicomponent crystal structures present in the Cambridge Structural Database (CSD). This reveals that all seven classes proposed are relevant in terms of frequency of occurrence. Lists of CSD refcodes for all classes are provided. We identified over 5000 cocrystals in the CSD, as well as over 12 000 crystals with more than two components. This illustrates that the possibilities for alternative drug formulations can be increased significantly by considering more than two components in drug design

Exergames for falls prevention in sheltered homes:A feasibility study

Introduction:Falls prevention is a global priority given its substantial impact on older adults and cost to healthcare systems. Advances in telerehabilitation technology such as `exergaming’ show potential for delivering accessible, engaging exercise programs for older adults. This study aimed to establish the feasibility, acceptability and usability of exergaming in sheltered housing.Methods: A mixed-methods study with participants randomised in 2 sheltered housing facilities to intervention (n = 1 home, 12 participants) and control (n = 1 home 2, 12 participants) provided usual care for all, (physiotherapy prescribed strength and balance exercises and falls prevention advice) and a 6-week supervised exergaming programme (MIRA) offered 3 times per week to the intervention group only. At 6 weeks, feasibility, usability and acceptability outcomes were collected and analysed using descriptive statistics; qualitative focus groups with participants and interviews with staff were also completed and thematically analysed to elicit barriers and facilitators to usability and acceptability.Results: Mean exercise per week increased from 10.6 to 14.1 minutes in the control group and 9.6 to 36.8 minutes in the intervention group. All study processes and measures appeared feasible; 72% of those invited consented to taking part and 92% completed 6-week follow-up. Individual domains for the System Usability Scores (SUS) showed participants felt veryconfident’usingthesystemwith⊃port(70%),wod−’sinℎℎ⊃or(70%),̲like to use exergames frequently’ (50%) and found the system easy→use’(90%).However,theyalsofe&lt;they→’(90%).,ℎ&lt;ℎneeded to learn a lot at the beginning’ (40%) and would `need technical support’ (70%) for independent use of the exergames. Mean overall SUS was 63 reflecting moderate usability for independent use. Qualitative data indicated exergames were well received and highlighted motivational and social aspects; costs and set up. Staff also felt exergaming complemented traditional care.Discussion: Our study contributes to the evidence guiding the use of exergames to deliver suitable falls prevention interventions for older adults within sheltered housing in community settings.<br/

Practical and validated tool to assess falls risk in the primary care setting:A systematic review

Objective: Although several falls risk assessment tools are available, it is unclear which have been validated and which would be most suitable for primary care practices. This systematic review aims to identify the most suitable falls risk assessment tool for the primary care setting (ie, requires limited time, no expensive equipment and no additional space) and that has good predictive performance in the assessment of falls risk among older people living independently. Design: A systematic review based on prospective studies. Methods: An extensive search was conducted in the following databases: PubMed, Embase, CINAHL, Cochrane and PsycINFO. Tools were excluded if they required expensive and/or advanced software that is not usually available in primary care units and if they had not been validated in at least three different studies. Of 2492 articles published between January 2000 and July 2020, 27 were included. Results: Six falls risk assessment tools were identified: Timed Up and Go (TUG) test, Gait Speed test, Berg Balance Scale, Performance Oriented Mobility Assessment, Functional Reach test and falls history. Most articles reported area under the curve (AUC) values ranging from 0.5 to 0.7 for these tools. Sensitivity and specificity varied substantially across studies (eg, TUG, sensitivity:10%–83.3%, specificity:28.4%–96.6%). Conclusions: Given that none of the falls risk assessment tools had sufficient predictive performance (AUC <0.7), other ways of assessing high falls risk among independently living older people in primary care should be investigated. For now, the most suitable way to assess falls risk in the primary care setting appears to involve asking patients about their falls history. Compared with the other five tools, the falls history requires the least amount of time, no expensive equipment, no training and no spatial adjustments. The clinical judgement of healthcare professionals continues to be most important, as it enables the identification of high falls risk even for patients with no falls history. Trial registraion number: The Netherlands Trial Register, NL7917; Pre-results

Expectancy effects in the EEG during joint and spontaneous word-by-word sentence production in German

Our aim in the present study is to measure neural correlates during spontaneous interactive sentence production. We present a novel approach using the word-by-word technique from improvisational theatre, in which two speakers jointly produce one sentence. This paradigm allows the assessment of behavioural aspects, such as turn-times, and electrophysiological responses, such as event-related-potentials (ERPs). Twenty-five participants constructed a cued but spontaneous four-word German sentence together with a confederate, taking turns for each word of the sentence. In 30% of the trials, the confederate uttered an unexpected gender-marked article. To complete the sentence in a meaningful way, the participant had to detect the violation and retrieve and utter a new fitting response. We found significant increases in response times after unexpected words and – despite allowing unscripted language production and naturally varying speech material – successfully detected significant N400 and P600 ERP effects for the unexpected word. The N400 EEG activity further significantly predicted the response time of the subsequent turn. Our results show that combining behavioural and neuroscientific measures of verbal interactions while retaining sufficient experimental control is possible, and that this combination provides promising insights into the mechanisms of spontaneous spoken dialogue

Income polarisation, expenditure and the Australian urban middle class

Hervorming Sociale Regelgevin