Spending power over superpower: an investigation of increasing diversity in the superhero genre

Superhero narratives mediate what the socio-political climate presents within our cultural history. This thesis aims to analyse the change of diversity in superhero narratives, predominantly the period of transition from comic-books to film and television properties. The major argument presented by this thesis is that the comic-book and film and television industries are compelled to be more diverse, not by developing a sense of morality, but rather through financial incentives provided by the companies growing and increasingly diverse audience. This thesis adopts a thematic approach and is divided into three sub-sections (industry, representation and diversity), each of which discusses an important aspect of the comic-book industries. The characters and themes discussed within representation and diversity are discussed within the context of the industry. Superheroes and characters such as Batman, Wonder Woman and Black Panther are prominently analysed due to their longevity and their relation to the industries’ motives. Through the use of primary and secondary source material, this thesis engages with an examination of comic-book, film and television narratives, in addition to the support and occasionally questioned discussion of scholarly viewpoints

Health Trainers End of Year Review 1st April 2013 – 31st March 2014

A critical assessment of health trainer activity, with particular reference to the most deprived social groups, and a focus on mental health and wellbeing

Transformation Based Ensembles for Time Series Classification

Until recently, the vast majority of data mining time series classification (TSC) research has focused on alternative distance measures for 1-Nearest Neighbour (1-NN) classifiers based on either the raw data, or on compressions or smoothing of the raw data. Despite the extensive evidence in favour of 1-NN classifiers with Euclidean or Dynamic Time Warping distance, there has also been a flurry of recent research publications proposing classification algorithms for TSC. Generally, these classifiers describe different ways of incorporating summary measures in the time domain into more complex classifiers. Our hypothesis is that the easiest way to gain improvement on TSC problems is simply to transform into an alternative data space where the discriminatory features are more easily detected. To test our hypothesis, we perform a range of benchmarking experiments in the time domain, before evaluating nearest neighbour classifiers on data transformed into the power spectrum, the autocorrelation function, and the principal component space. We demonstrate that on some problems there is dramatic improvement in the accuracy of classifiers built on the transformed data over classifiers built in the time domain, but that there is also a wide variance in accuracy for a particular classifier built on different data transforms. To overcome this variability, we propose a simple transformation based ensemble, then demonstrate that it improves performance and reduces the variability of classifiers built in the time domain only. Our advice to a practitioner with a real world TSC problem is to try transforms before developing a complex classifier; it is the easiest way to get a potentially large increase in accuracy, and may provide further insights into the underlying relationships that characterise the problem

An evaluation of the Bradford Beating Diabetes Intensive Lifestyle Change Programme

Introduction The rise of Type 2 Diabetes is a major public health issue. Bradford, a city with high rates of deprivation and a large South Asian community (both factors being associated with a higher risk of developing diabetes), has piloted a programme that aims to tackle this issue. This paper reports on an evaluation of this Intensive Lifestyle Change Programme (ILCP). Targeted at high-risk individuals, the year-long, group-based ILCP is facilitated by health champions, from local communities. Beneficiaries receive advice on lifestyle changes, information and support and are encouraged to set behaviour change goals. 587 people have started the ILCP since it started in 2014. Methods The evaluation comprised of; pre and post clinical tests and questionnaires to measure changes in behaviour and health and wellbeing plus focus groups to ascertain participants’ views of the ILCP. The Results 57 people completed pre and post data. Statistically significant decreases in blood sugar levels were found plus statistically significant increases in; knowledge about diabetes, moderate physical activity, fruit and vegetable consumption and self-rated health. The programme was very positively appraised in eight focus groups. Key success factors include; the referral process, non-clinical people facilitating, group support, language diversity and culturally appropriate advice. Conclusion This evaluation demonstrates the effectiveness of a programme to prevent Type 2 diabetes in a disadvantaged community and its acceptability to beneficiaries. Learnings can be utilised elsewhere provided programmes are adapted to suit communities’ specific needs

Community engagement: what the NICE guidance means for community practitioners

This article draws on the updated guidance on community engagement from the National Institute of Health and Care Excellence (NICE 2016), and the evidence that informed that guidance, to discuss the role and potential of engaging with the community in primary care, to improve health and wellbeing. In practice, there are several different ways of engaging with communities, and practitioners need to choose the way that is the best fit with their project, community and ways of working. A guide to community centred approaches recently published by Public Health England and NHS England, maps the range of evidence based options, and two examples from the UK are used to illustrate different approaches to community engagement: one in which lay people from the community delivered a diabetes education project, and one in which volunteers worked with a specialist nurse to provide a holistic arthritis support service

The self-care for people initiative: the outcome evaluation.

To determine the effects of a community-based training programme in self-care on the lay population