Unbroken : personal storytelling as a method of illuminating parenting experiences of disability, illness and diversity

This project examines how personal storytelling can be used to illuminate and further develop understanding of illness, disability and diversity. Through an exegesis and creative component, it explores the notion that we live on a human continuum, and how the sharing of stories can help to break down the ‘them and us’ and ‘normal and abnormal’ dichotomy so often found in dialogue on illness and disability. The author proposes that personal storytelling can disrupt definitions around normality and instead offer a tool to assist in the development, and enhancement, of empathy. The creative component of this project is a multi-layered text that examines the experiences of family units living with what was formerly known as Asperger’s syndrome, then high functioning autism, and now autism. Indeed, the lived experience of those on the spectrum can resist well-ordered classification. This section combines the author’s own story as a mother, interviews with other families and individuals, and reflections on the process of researching and writing about autism. Incorporating a critical self-consciousness into her writing, the author ruminates on the complexities of parenting a son who is ‘on the spectrum’ by adopting a “wondering gaze”, as Max van Manen (2002) terms it, with the answers found in the “experience of writing itself” or in this “writerly space where reigns the ultimate incomprehensibility of things…the uncanny rumble of existence itself” (p. 243). The exegesis discusses the altruistic motivation for using self-reflexive writing techniques in narrative representations of illness and disability. As sociologist Marjorie L. DeVault (1997) writes: “[personal writing] makes excluded voices ‘hearable’ within a dominant discourse” and “is useful for exploring the unexpected and thus for bringing to light aspects of ‘ordinary’ experience that are typically obscured” (p. 226). It is particularly important to address the ‘social’ and the ‘ordinary’ everyday experiences within illness and disability because they are often neglected in the medical setting. Yet such experiences are what make a person whole—they are, of course, so much more than their physical symptoms and treatments (Richards, 2008; Carel, 2008). Through an analysis of texts by parents raising children with disabilities, the exegesis explores the advantages and drawbacks of vulnerable writing about oneself and others. It is proposed that researching and writing with reflexivity not only allows authors to better understand themselves, but also opens the door to reader empathy, creating a sense of connection for readers and a greater understanding of the ethnographic subject matter by pushing against assumptions and breaking down stereotypes. Simultaneously, the author applies this knowledge to her creative project to illuminate the nuances of families living with autism. As such, the research provides an avenue that affords some empathy for the people in the stories told, and subsequently becomes a tool for understanding, for it is through connecting with others’ stories, chaotic as they may be, that we make meaning of experiences and sense of our lives (Mattingly & Garro, 2000)

Out-of-Home-Care (OOHC) Digital Lives: A Collaborative Investigation into Digital Opportunities for the Personal Narratives of Young People in Care

It is well understood that the ability to capture and store personal records and memorabilia such as photographs, journals and memory boxes is critical for young people in Out-Of-Home Care (OOHC). These materials represent anchors in a young person's 'story of the self' and can be integral to ongoing life story work which aims to support positive identity, belonging and resilience for those in care by helping them document their personal histories. To date, most life story work has been oriented around hard copy systems that are reliant on carers to keep and maintain. This research explores the role a digital platform can play in supporting the collection and maintenance of a young person in care's personal archiving practices. Building on foundational studies that demonstrate the critical role of life story work in supporting a person in care's self-knowing, but which also acknowledge the challenges within the sector that can impede effective record keeping, it argues for the benefits of using digital formats in conjunction with more traditional methods for personal memory keeping work. Our report, Out of Home Care Digital Lives, documents and presents the findings from research undertaken between October 2018 and mid 2021 that canvassed a cross-section of issues that impact and shape the way life story work is undertaken in the sector and the opportunities for incorporating digital methods and platforms. It includes interviews and survey responses from a range of OOHC stakeholders, including young people, carers and agency staff, that examine the critical role of personal record keeping in fostering positive identity and self-understanding, and the conditions that are required to encourage the commencement and continuation of such practices, especially in times of chronic disruption. Critically, the report includes a case study analysis of stakeholders' experience of a well-known hard-copy life storying resource called My Life Story, developed by the NSW Department of Family & Community Services (formerly the Department of Families and Community Services) in 2004. It compares this to an Australian digital life story app called CaringLife (2019) developed by Victorian company Nautilus Media for young people in the OOHC sector. Life story books are seen as a product of wider life story work: while there is no single definition of life story work, it is based on theories of attachment and loss and aims to help children understand their time in care (Watson, Hahn and Staines, 2020). There is substantial variation across Australia in how life story work is undertaken, and variations within states (Campbell 2009; Harper, 1996; Willis & Holland, 2009). The report draws on interviews with people who have used My Life Story and CaringLife, including young people in OOHC and their case workers to show that the therapeutic benefits of life story work (Rose, 2012) can be extended to the digital sphere. Working in partnership with Nautilus Media, our work shows that digital communication tools oriented around memory keeping and life story work can ultimately help young people in OOHC experience ownership and self-efficacy, develop a greater sense of belonging and identity, and contribute to long-term mental health and social and cultural wellbeing. The digital depository can also improve service delivery for case managers and support practitioners by securing ongoing bonds of engagement and supporting better use of technology to promote resilience for young people in OOHC. The findings contribute to a growing body of theoretical and experiential knowledge about the positive impact of life-story record keeping on OOHC young people's experience and expression of agency, autonomy and identity. Our report concludes with a series of recommendations that aim to improve the outcomes and experiences of OOHC youth and provide the basis for an integrated and comprehensive response across all states and territories

Terrestrial Mammal Conservation: Global Evidence for the Effects of Interventions for terrestrial mammals excluding bats and primates

Terrestrial Mammal Conservation provides a thorough summary of the available scientific evidence of what is known, or not known, about the effectiveness of all of the conservation actions for wild terrestrial mammals across the world (excluding bats and primates, which are covered in separate synopses). Actions are organized into categories based on the International Union for Conservation of Nature classifications of direct threats and conservation actions. Over the course of fifteen chapters, the authors consider interventions as wide ranging as creating uncultivated margins around fields, prescribed burning, setting hunting quotas and removing non-native mammals.This book is written in an accessible style and is designed to be an invaluable resource for anyone concerned with the practical conservation of terrestrial mammals.The authors consulted an international group of terrestrial mammal experts and conservationists to produce this synopsis. Funding was provided by the MAVA Foundation, Arcadia and National Geographic Big Cats Initiative.Terrestrial Mammal Conservation is the seventeenth publication in the Conservation Evidence Series, linked to the online resource www.ConservationEvidence.com. Conservation Evidence Synopses are designed to promote a more evidence-based approach to biodiversity conservation. Others in the series include Bat Conservation, Primate Conservation, Bird Conservation and Forest Conservation and more are in preparation. Expert assessment of the evidence summarised within synopses is provided online and within the annual publication What Works in Conservation

Feasibility of the Go2Play Active Play intervention for increasing physical and social development in children with intellectual disabilities

Introduction: An active play is designed to increase children’s physical activity levels and fundamental movement skills through outdoor play and is well-suited to the needs of children with intellectual disabilities. However, no active play interventions have included children with intellectual disabilities. This study aims to investigate the feasibility of a school-based active play intervention for children with intellectual disabilities. Method: Children aged 7–12 years who had intellectual disabilities and were independently ambulatory were eligible. This single-group 17-week intervention was implemented in two additional support needs schools. It consisted of a weekly 1-h active play session incorporating 30 min of structured games and 30 min of free play. Feasibility of recruitment/retention, adherence, and outcome measures were investigated. Outcome measures included school-based physical activity (ActiGraph GT3X+ accelerometer), fundamental movement skills (Test of Gross Motor Development-2), and social interactions (Playground Observation of Peer Engagement). Staff feedback was collected via open-ended questionnaire. Feasibility was investigated using descriptive statistics and questionnaire data analyzed using thematic analysis. Potential pre-post changes were investigated for school-based physical activity, fundamental movement skills, and social interactions using paired samples t tests. The progression criteria were (1) > 50% of eligible participants recruited, (2) > 50% of recruited participants retained, (3) > 50% of active play sessions spent in MVPA, and (4) > 50% of participants complete outcome measurements. Results: All progression criteria were met. Recruitment and retention rates were 100% (n=21 participants). Intervention adherence was high, based on data from n=1 school, with 90% of participants attending all sessions. Measuring physical activity using accelerometry and fundamental movement skills using the Test of Gross Motor Development-2 were feasible. The Playground Observation of Peer Engagement tool to measure social interactions was not feasible. The only significant increase post-intervention was for social interactions during structured play (pre–post mean difference: –1.46, 95% CI −1.99, −0.93). Staff feedback was positive with the intervention well received by schools and potential benefits post-intervention identified by teachers. Conclusion: The Go2Play Active Play intervention is feasible for children with intellectual disabilities. Future research should further investigate feasibility and implementation on a larger scale using a pilot cluster randomised controlled trial

Optical Identification of Materials Transformations in Oxide Thin Films

Recent advances in high-throughput experimentation for combinatorial studies have accelerated the discovery and analysis of materials across a wide range of compositions and synthesis conditions. However, many of the more powerful characterization methods are limited by speed, cost, availability, and/or resolution. To make efficient use of these methods, there is value in developing approaches for identifying critical compositions and conditions to be used as a-priori knowledge for follow-up characterization with high-precision techniques, such as micron-scale synchrotron based X-ray diffraction (XRD). Here we demonstrate the use of optical microscopy and reflectance spectroscopy to identify likely phase-change boundaries in thin film libraries. These methods are used to delineate possible metastable phase boundaries following lateral-gradient Laser Spike Annealing (lg-LSA) of oxide materials. The set of boundaries are then compared with definitive determinations of structural transformations obtained using high-resolution XRD. We demonstrate that the optical methods detect more than 95% of the structural transformations in a composition-gradient La-Mn-O library and a Ga$_2$O$_3$ sample, both subject to an extensive set of lg-LSA anneals. Our results provide quantitative support for the value of optically-detected transformations as a priori data to guide subsequent structural characterization, ultimately accelerating and enhancing the efficient implementation of $\mu$m-resolution XRD experiments

Terrestrial Mammal Conservation

"Terrestrial Mammal Conservation provides a thorough summary of the available scientific evidence of what is known, or not known, about the effectiveness of all of the conservation actions for wild terrestrial mammals across the world (excluding bats and primates, which are covered in separate synopses). Actions are organized into categories based on the International Union for Conservation of Nature classifications of direct threats and conservation actions. Over the course of fifteen chapters, the authors consider interventions as wide ranging as creating uncultivated margins around fields, prescribed burning, setting hunting quotas and removing non-native mammals. This book is written in an accessible style and is designed to be an invaluable resource for anyone concerned with the practical conservation of terrestrial mammals. The authors consulted an international group of terrestrial mammal experts and conservationists to produce this synopsis. Funding was provided by the MAVA Foundation, Arcadia and National Geographic Big Cats Initiative. Terrestrial Mammal Conservation is the seventeenth publication in the Conservation Evidence Series, linked to the online resource www.ConservationEvidence.com. Conservation Evidence Synopses are designed to promote a more evidence-based approach to biodiversity conservation. Others in the series include Bat Conservation, Primate Conservation, Bird Conservation and Forest Conservation and more are in preparation. Expert assessment of the evidence summarised within synopses is provided online and within the annual publication What Works in Conservation.

Revealing stromal and lymphoid sources of Col3a1-expression during inflammation using a novel reporter mouse

One of the earliest signs of dysregulation of the homeostatic process of fibrosis, associated with pathology in chronic conditions such as rheumatoid arthritis (RA), is the overexpression of collagen type III (COL-3). Critically, there is still relatively little known regarding the identity of the cell types expressing the gene encoding COL-3 (Col3a1). Identifying and characterising Col3a1-expressing cells during the development of fibrosis could reveal new targets for diagnosis and treatment of fibrosis-related pathologies. As such, a reporter mouse expressing concomitantly Col3a1 and mKate-2, a fluorescent protein, was generated. Using models of footpad inflammation, we demonstrated its effectiveness as a tool to measure the expression of COL-3 during the repair process and provided an initial characterisation of some of the stromal and immune cells responsible for Col3a1 expression

Sex-differential non-vaccine specific immunological effects of diphtheria-tetanus-pertussis and measles vaccination

Vaccines can have nontargeted heterologous effects that manifest as increased protection against nonvaccine infections, as described for measles vaccine (MV), or increased susceptibility to infections and death, as described following diphtheria-tetanus-whole cell pertussis (DTP) vaccination. The mechanisms are unknown, and high-quality immunological studies are lacking. This study was designed to investigate the heterologous effects of MV and DTP in 302 Gambian infants. The results support a sex-differential immunosuppressive effect of DTP on innate proinflammatory responses and T-cell immunity. Males but not females receiving MV had enhanced proinflammatory innate responses. The results point to modified signaling via Toll-like receptor 4 (TLR4) as a possible mechanism for the effects on innate immunity. When both vaccines were administered together, purified protein derivative responses were enhanced in females but downregulated in males. Collectively, these data indicate immunological effects that could account for heterologous effects of MV and DTP, to take forward into prospective trials