The perceived social impacts of the 2006 World Cup on Munich residents

All major sporting events result in a variety of impacts upon the host community. To date, the majority of existing studies have focused upon the wider economic impacts, with few empirical studies of the social impacts upon local residents. This paper explores the perceived impacts of the 2006 Football World Cup upon residents of one of the host cities–Munich. Using a multi-stage sampling technique, 180 Munich residents were randomly selected. Of these, 132 agreed to participate in face-to-face interviews. Findings from the study suggested that the impacts were largely perceived as positive by residents, especially in terms of urban regeneration, increased sense of security, positive fan behaviour and the general atmosphere surrounding the event. Negative impacts, such as increased crime, prostitution, and displacement of local residents were perceived by fewer respondents. Further analysis demonstrates that such perceptions are not dependent upon socio-demographic factors such as age, gender or length of residence in the city

The research, design and concept development of a new chair to meet the needs of breastfeeding women and their infants

It has long been recognised that breastfeeding rates in the UK are substantially below an optimal level to promote the health of mothers and infants. While there are many variables which affect a mother's decision to breastfeed a significant factor in the discontinuation of breastfeeding is infant distress, maternal distress and maternal pain and discomfort brought about through poor positioning. Poor positioning is often the result of the wholly unsuitable type of furniture that mothers use to aid breastfeeding whether making use of furniture supplied in hospitals, GP waiting areas and clinics, or making use of the domestic furniture to be found in the family home. However, despite this it remains true that to date, despite a perceived need to design a breastfeeding chair, there has been no published research which has tested furniture designed to assist breastfeeding and there is no furniture currently in production which supports the needs of breastfeeding women. It has been the purpose of this thesis to specifically examine and address these observations and to explore the feasibility of a breastfeeding chair suited to the needs of breastfeeding women. In order to do this the thesis reviews furniture which has been improvised and appropriated for breastfeeding and through a series of case studies, analyses examples of breastfeeding posture in order to generate relevant and unique ergonomic data. Through further allied research, related cultural and medical issues are also identified and discussed in order that an appropriate design brief for a breastfeeding chair might be defined and its specification detailed. Finally, in order to explicate the design process, the thesis traces the development of the chair through prototyping and into its eventual commercial production. The thesis concludes with a critique of that process and recommendations for further research

Where the wild things are: Evolving futures of communications regulation in the current national security context

In March 2008, the Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA) released a report dealing with the possible implications of the ‘top six trends’ in communications and media technologies, applications and services. The report highlights the fact that key regulatory elements in the communications environment are being conceptually ‘stretched and pulled’ by the accelerating pace of change in communications technologies, applications and services. The report also notes that in the longer term, there will be increasing overlapping developments in technology and increasing interconnections between people, databases and objects.&nbsp

Voice parameters predict sex-specific body morphology in men and women

Studies of several mammalian species confirm that formant frequencies (vocal tract resonances) predict height and weight better than does fundamental frequency (F0, perceived as pitch) in same-sex adults due to differential anatomical constraints. However, our recent meta-analysis (Pisanski et al., 2014, Animal Behaviour, 95, 89–99) indicated that formants and F0 could explain no more than 10% and 2% of the variance in human height, respectively, controlling for sex and age. Here, we examined whether other voice parameters, many of which are affected by sex hormones, can indicate additional variance in human body size or shape, and whether these relationships differ between the sexes. Using a cross-cultural sample of 700 men and women, we examined relationships among 19 voice parameters (minimum–maximum F0, mean F0, F0 variability, formant-based vocal tract length estimates, shimmer, jitter, harmonics-to-noise ratio) and eight indices of body size or shape (height, weight, body mass index, hip, waist and chest circumferences, waist-to-hip ratio, chest-to-hip ratio). Our results confirm that formant measures explain the most variance in heights and weights of men and women, whereas shimmer, jitter and harmonics-to-noise ratio do not indicate height, weight or body mass index in either sex. In contrast, these perturbation and noise parameters, in addition to F0 range and variability, explained more variance in body shape than did formants or mean F0, particularly among men. Shimmer or jitter explained the most variance in men's hip circumferences (12%) and chest-to-hip ratios (6%), whereas harmonics-to-noise ratio and formants explained the most variance in women's waist-to-hip ratios (11%), and significantly more than in men's waist-to-hip ratios. Our study represents the most comprehensive analysis of vocal indicators of human body size to date and offers a foundation for future research examining the hormonal mechanisms of voice production in humans and perceptual playback experiments

Oligonucleotide therapies in the treatment of arthritis:a narrative review

Osteoarthritis (OA) and rheumatoid arthritis (RA) are two of the most common chronic inflammatory joint diseases, for which there remains a great clinical need to develop safer and more efficacious pharmacological treatments. The pathology of both OA and RA involves multiple tissues within the joint, including the synovial joint lining and the bone, as well as the articular cartilage in OA. In this review, we discuss the potential for the development of oligonucleotide therapies for these disorders by examining the evidence that oligonucleotides can modulate the key cellular pathways that drive the pathology of the inflammatory diseased joint pathology, as well as evidence in preclinical in vivo models that oligonucleotides can modify disease progression

Facial, olfactory, and vocal cues to female reproductive value.

Facial, olfactory, and vocal cues may advertise women's fertility. However, most of the evidence for this proposal has come from studies of changes in young adult women's attractiveness over the menstrual cycle. By contrast with this emphasis on changes in attractiveness over the menstrual cycle, possible changes in women's attractiveness over their lifespan have received little attention. The present study investigated men's ratings of young girls' (11-15 years old), adult women's (19-30 years old) and circum-menopausal women's (50-65 years old) facial, body odor, and vocal attractiveness and femininity. Faces and voices, but not body odors, of young girls and adult women were perceived to be significantly more attractive and feminine than those of circum-menopausal women. These data suggest that facial and vocal cues may be cues to women's reproductive value, but that body odor cues do not necessarily advertise this information

The impact of a reading intervention program on students with reading difficulties

The primary purpose of this study was to compare the impact of a reading intervention program, Read 180/System 44, on students in a Behavior Disabilities class, with students in a Learning and/or Language disabilities class and an at risk group of students from the general education population. The researcher collected pre and post data in September and February. The classroom teachers implemented the Read 180/System 44 program for approximately five months. The at risk general education program displayed the most significant growth. The students in the Behavior Disabilities class as well as those in the Learning and/or Language group also responded positively to the reading intervention program. The current results, as well as previous research suggest that the 180/System44 program may be effective for struggling readers

Submission for 2023-2030 Australian Cyber Security Strategy Discussion Paper

three main points are as follows: 1. Cyber security and cyber resilience require a shared national strategic vision, supported by laws, policies, advocacy, education, skills, training, and funding. The government is asking everyone – individuals, families, communities, regions, cities, businesses, not-for-profits, governments – to opt-in to that vision. To achieve national alignment and clarity, collaboration, communication, and cooperation will be the crucial mechanisms for success and managing complexity. This requires understanding what is already there (the full complexity of the existing legal and policy framework) before adding new components. 2 2. Cyber security, like many other complex fields,1 exists in shared regulatory space.2 Overlapping regulatory frameworks, functions and authority are normal in a complex field such as cyber security. Research in Australia and elsewhere demonstrates that the best strategy for mitigating the known harms, and harnessing the known benefits, of regulatory overlap is the use of enhanced coordination and cooperation tools. A new Cyber Security Act could achieve this by engaging directly with the coordination and cooperation challenges of multiple agencies, regulators, departments, and stakeholders. However, in enhancing cooperation and coordination, strong accountability and transparency mechanisms must be hardwired into the regulation. 3. New mechanisms for reform must aim to improve cyber security outcomes for society, the economy, and the national interest. A new Cyber Security Act and further amendments to the Security of Critical Infrastructure Act 2018 (Cth) (‘SOCI’) provide publicly scrutinised legislative solutions to the problems cyber security policy seeks to solve. While flexibility for government and businesses is important, government must carefully assess the kind of matters that can be decided in delegated legislation (eg, regulations, declarations, notices), or in co-regulatory and self-regulatory mechanisms (eg, codes of practice, guidelines, assessments, standards), and those which belong in the primary legislation due to: their importance to the operation of a legislative scheme; the need for certainty and clarity around obligations; and to support Australia’s underlying democratic values