Variation in African American parents' use of early childhood physical discipline

Physical discipline is endorsed by a majority of adults in the U.S. including African American (AA) parents who have high rates of endorsement. Although many studies have examined physical discipline use among AA families, few have considered how early childhood physical discipline varies within the population. Individuals within a cultural group may differ in their engagement in cultural practices (Rogoff, 2003). Furthermore, AA families’ characteristics and their contexts, which are shaped by the interaction of social position, racism, and segregation (García Coll et al., 1996), likely influence how AA families physically discipline their young children. This study examined variation in early childhood physical discipline among AA families living in low-income communities and relations with demographic and contextual factors. Year 1 data from 310 AA parents living in three regionally distinct low-income communities were used from a sequential longitudinal intervention program study of the development and prevention of conduct disorder. Latent class analyses were conducted using parents’ responses on a measure, of the frequency of overall physical discipline, spanking, and hitting during prekindergarten and kindergarten. The associations between latent classes and six demographic and contextual factors were examined using the Bolck, Croon, and Hagenaars (BCH) method. The factors were: child gender (59% male); marital status (51% never married); parental education (66% high school graduates and beyond); income (mean = $16.66K, S.D. = 12.50), family stress, and perception of neighborhood safety. Measures included the Family Information Form, Life Changes, and the Neighborhood Questionnaire. After considering two to seven class solutions, five physical discipline classes or sub-groups were identified. Classes were defined by discipline frequency (‘Infrequent’, ‘Weekly’, ‘Monthly’, ‘Almost-Every-Day’ and ‘Weekly-All’) as well as by discipline type (only parents in the ‘Weekly-All’ class hit their children). Significant associations were found between class membership, and child gender, marital status, income, and perception of neighborhood safety. Girls were more likely to be physically disciplined infrequently, χ2(4, N = 310) = 11.88, p = .05. The ‘Weekly’ class had significantly fewer married parents than all classes except ‘Almost-Every-Day’, χ2(4, N = 310) = 21.56, p < .001. Parents in the ‘Almost-Every-Day’ class had a significantly lower income than parents in all other classes except “Weekly-All”, χ2(4, N = 310) = 10.88, p = .03. Finally, parents in the “Almost-Every-Day” class perceived their neighborhood as significantly less safe compared to those in all other classes except the ‘Weekly-All’ class, χ2(4, N = 310) = 14.13 p = .01. These findings suggest that AA families vary in physical discipline during early childhood; this variation may result in sub-groups with different demographic characteristics. Associations between frequent discipline classes and perceptions of neighborhood safety implies that some AA parents may use physical discipline to protect their children from being harmed if they believe their communities are unsafe. Future research should qualitatively examine how AA parents respond to unsafe neighborhoods in their parenting behaviors, including physical discipline

Bullying Prevention: How to Foster Positive Interactions Among Elementary Aged Youth

Bullying has been identified as one of the most widespread forms of violence encountered in U.S. schools, with 30% of children reporting being the victims of bullying sometime during their lives, and approximately 10% reporting being victimized on a regular basis. This research sought to identify common threads that seem important for individuals working with children in school settings to be aware of in order to effectively prevent and respond to bullying based on current prevention efforts and curriculum a sample of Minnesota schools are currently utilizing. A qualitative research design was used to obtain data from a sample of seven school social workers, and data reduction was used to interpret the findings. The findings indicated the importance of social skill development among students, the use of formal and informal curriculum and programming, community building and active supervision, and the bystander effect. The findings speak to the importance of school staff to create a positive school climate, utilize curriculum and other individualized interventions, develop positive relationships with students, increase the level of adult supervision within the schools, and ensure consistent expectations and common language throughout the school in order to effectively prevent and intervene when children are involved in bullying

Bullying Prevention: How to Foster Positive Interactions Among Elementary Aged Youth

Bullying has been identified as one of the most widespread forms of violence encountered in U.S. schools, with 30% of children reporting being the victims of bullying sometime during their lives, and approximately 10% reporting being victimized on a regular basis. This research sought to identify common threads that seem important for individuals working with children in school settings to be aware of in order to effectively prevent and respond to bullying based on current prevention efforts and curriculum a sample of Minnesota schools are currently utilizing. A qualitative research design was used to obtain data from a sample of seven school social workers, and data reduction was used to interpret the findings. The findings indicated the importance of social skill development among students, the use of formal and informal curriculum and programming, community building and active supervision, and the bystander effect. The findings speak to the importance of school staff to create a positive school climate, utilize curriculum and other individualized interventions, develop positive relationships with students, increase the level of adult supervision within the schools, and ensure consistent expectations and common language throughout the school in order to effectively prevent and intervene when children are involved in bullying

Accelerated Tensile-Tensile Fatigue Testing of Long Fiber Thermoplastic Materials

Fatigue characterization is one of the most time consuming and expensive tests that a material must undergo prior to adoption into critical industries and/or uses. Most fatigue testing is conducted by alternating between a low tensile load and a high tensile load until the material fails, which yields a cycle count to failure for a given loading scenario. Compiling a graph with multiple loading scenarios generates a failure threshold that is used to design a part for the number of loading cycles expected to witness during its service life. The studies presented attempted to determine testing methodology to reduce the required testing time from 3 weeks to 1 week by taking advantage of Cumulative Damage Theory. Several methods were examined, and it was concluded that there may be a path that could be used to generate such time savings

Carbon and Strontium Abundances of Metal-Poor Stars

We present carbon and strontium abundances for 100 metal-poor stars measured from R$\sim$7000 spectra obtained with the Echellette Spectrograph and Imager at the Keck Observatory. Using spectral synthesis of the G-band region, we have derived carbon abundances for stars ranging from [Fe/H]$=-1.3$ to [Fe/H]$=-3.8$. The formal errors are $\sim 0.2$ dex in [C/Fe]. The strontium abundance in these stars was measured using spectral synthesis of the resonance line at 4215 {\AA}. Using these two abundance measurments along with the barium abundances from our previous study of these stars, we show it is possible to identify neutron-capture-rich stars with our spectra. We find, as in other studies, a large scatter in [C/Fe] below [Fe/H]$= -2$. Of the stars with [Fe/H]$<-2$, 9$\pm$4% can be classified as carbon-rich metal-poor stars. The Sr and Ba abundances show that three of the carbon-rich stars are neutron-capture-rich, while two have normal Ba and Sr. This fraction of carbon enhanced stars is consistent with other studies that include this metallicity range.Comment: ApJ, Accepte

Common and Distinct Mechanisms of Cognitive Flexibility in Prefrontal Cortex

The human ability to flexibly alternate between tasks represents a central component of cognitive control. Neuroimaging studies have linked task switching with a diverse set of prefrontal cortex (PFC) regions, but the contributions of these regions to various forms of cognitive flexibility remain largely unknown. Here, subjects underwent functional brain imaging while they completed a paradigm that selectively induced stimulus, response, or cognitive set switches in the context of a single task decision performed on a common set of stimuli. Behavioral results indicated comparable reaction time costs associated with each switch type. Domain-general task-switching activation was observed in the inferior frontal junction and posterior parietal cortex, suggesting core roles for these regions in switching such as updating and representing task sets. In contrast, multiple domain-preferential PFC activations were observed across lateral and medial PFC, with progressively more rostral regions recruited as switches became increasingly abstract. Specifically, highly abstract cognitive set switches recruited anterior-PFC regions, moderately abstract response switches recruited mid-PFC regions, and highly constrained stimulus switches recruited posterior-PFC regions. These results demonstrate a functional organization across lateral and medial PFC according to the level of abstraction associated with acts of cognitive flexibility

Associations of childcare type, age at start, and intensity with body mass index trajectories from 10 to 42 years of age in the 1970 British Cohort Study.

BACKGROUND: Attending childcare is related to greater childhood obesity risk, but there are few long-term follow-up studies. We aimed to examine the associations of childcare type, age at start, and intensity with body mass index body mass index (BMI) trajectories from ages 10 to 42 years. METHODS: The sample comprised 8234 individuals in the 1970 British Cohort Study, who had data on childcare attendance (no, yes), type (formal, informal), age at start (4-5, 3-3.99, 0-2.99 years old), and intensity (1, 2, 3, 4-5 days/week) reported at age 5 years and 32 563 BMI observations. Multilevel linear spline models were used to estimate the association of each exposure with the sample-average BMI trajectory, with covariate adjustment. A combined age at start and intensity exposure was also examined. RESULTS: Attending vs not attending and the type of childcare (none vs formal/informal) were not strongly related to BMI trajectories. Among participants who attended childcare 1 to 2 days a week, those who started when 3 to 3.99 years old had a 0.197 (-0.004, 0.399) kg/m2 higher BMI at age 10 years than those who started when 4 to 5 years old, and those who started when 0 to 2.99 years old had a 0.289 (0.049, 0.529) kg/m2 higher BMI. A similar dose-response pattern for intensity was observed when holding age at start constant. By age 42 years, individuals who started childcare at age 0 to 2.99 years and attended 3 to 5 days/week had a 1.356 kg/m2 (0.637, 2.075) higher BMI than individuals who started at age 4 to 5 years and attended 1 to 2 days/week. CONCLUSIONS: Children who start childcare earlier and/or attend more frequently may have greater long-term obesity risk.WJ is supported by the UK Medical Research Council (New Investigator Research Grant: MR/P023347/1) and acknowledges support from the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) Leicester Biomedical Research Centre, which is a partnership between University Hospitals of Leicester NHS Trust, Loughborough University, and the University of Leicester. JA is funded by the Centre for Diet and Activity Research (CEDAR), a UKCRC Public Health Research Centre of Excellence which is funded by the British Heart Foundation, Cancer Research UK, Economic and Social Research Council, Medical Research Council, the National Institute for Health Research, and the Wellcome Trust (MRC administered grant MR/K023187/1)

Takotsubo Cardiomyopathy: A Case Series and Review of the Literature

Takotsubo cardiomyopathy (TCM) is an unusual form of acute cardiomyopathy showing left ventricular apical ballooning. It is often triggered by intense physical or emotional distress. We report here four cases of TCM and a review of the literature on the topic

Net Geochemical Release of Base Cations from 25 Forested Watersheds in the Catskill Region of New York

Chemical weathering of minerals is the principal mechanism by which base cations (Ca2+, Mg2+, K+, and Na+) are released and acidity is neutralized in soils, bedrock and drainage waters. Quantifying the release of base cations from watershed soils is therefore crucial for the calculation of “critical loads” of atmospheric acidity to forest ecosystems. We used a mass-balance approach to estimate the rate of release of base cations in 25 headwater catchments in the Catskill region of New York, an area historically subject to high inputs of acid deposition. In 2010-2013, total net base cation release via geochemical processes averaged 1704 eq ha-1 yr-1 (range: 928-2622). Calcium accounted for 58% of this total, averaging 498 mol ha-1 yr-1 (range: 209-815). Mass balance estimates of net geochemical release of base cations were most strongly driven by stream export and biomass uptake fluxes, with only minor contributions from precipitation. Documented rates of base cation depletion from soil exchange sites in the region were also small relative to the net geochemical release rates. We observed a significant influence of bedrock type on net base cation release rates (P = 0.002), and a weak but significant negative correlation with watershed elevation (r = -0.51). Relationships with other geographic factors such as aspect and watershed size were not significant. Net base cation release was 4.5 times higher than precipitation inputs of SO42- and NO3-, suggesting that sources of acidity internal to the watershed are now more important drivers of weathering than acid deposition. Our data suggest that release of base cations from most Catskill forest soils is sufficient to neutralize existing inputs of acidity

Crowdsourcing the Disaster Management Cycle

Crowdsourcing is a communication platform that can be used during and after a disastrous event. Previous research in crisis crowdsourcing demonstrates its wide adoption for aiding response efforts by non-government organizations and public citizens. There is a gap in understanding the government use of crowdsourcing for emergency management, and in the use of crowdsourcing for mitigation and preparedness. This research aims to characterize crowdsourcing in all phases of the disaster management cycle by government agencies in Canada and the USA. Semi-structured interviews conducted with 22 government officials from both countries reveal that crisis crowdsourced information is used in all phases of the disaster management cycle, though direct crowdsourcing is yet to be applied in the pre-disaster phases. Emergency management officials and scholars have an opportunity to discover new ways to directly use crowdsourcing for mitigation and preparedness