Integrative Approaches to the Undergraduate Public Health Major Curriculum: Strengths, Challenges, and Examples

Many “first generation” undergraduate public health degree programs were designed based on “siloed” course structures centered around subunits in the discipline (e.g., Introduction to Epidemiology, Introduction to Environmental Health) that may be meaningful primarily to experts in the field. An alternative to the siloed approach is an integrative curricular design, in which courses are designed around meaningful thematic units (e.g., explaining public health problems, asking and answering scientific questions in public health), with an emphasis on drawing connections between knowledge from different but complementary disciplinary areas as a means to improve student learning and retention. The integrative approach shifts the curriculum conversation to capitalize on the interdisciplinary roots of the public health profession. This approach is consistent with the learning outcome recommendations in the Framing the Future Task Force report and in the CEPH requirements for the undergraduate public health major. We explore integrative approaches to developing curricular models for undergraduate public health programs and discuss both pedagogical and career preparation arguments supporting an integrative curriculum approach. These include facilitating the often-challenging task for students of seeing how concepts interrelate, making transparent how “basic” knowledge in the discipline relates to “real world” applications of the content, and better mirroring how professionals in the discipline actually use knowledge in practice. Finally, we review examples of core concepts and features in an integrative curriculum approach to the undergraduate public health major as an effective educational program with high-quality, learner-centered educational experiences

The Effect of Online Chapter Quizzes on Exam Performance in an Undergraduate Social Psychology Course

Assigned textbook readings are a common requirement in undergraduate courses, but students often do not complete reading assignments or do not do so until immediately before an exam. This may have detrimental effects on learning and course performance. Regularly scheduled quizzes on reading material may increase completion of reading assignments and therefore course performance. This study examined the effectiveness of compulsory, mastery-based, weekly reading quizzes as a means of improving exam and course performance. Completion of reading quizzes was related to both better exam and course performance. The discussion includes recommendations for the use of quizzes in undergraduate courses

Planning versus action: Different decision-making processes predict plans to change one’s diet versus actual dietary behavior

Most health decision-making models posit that deciding to engage in a health behavior involves forming a behavioral intention which then leads to actual behavior. However, behavioral intentions and actual behavior may not be functionally equivalent. Two studies examined whether decision-making factors predicting dietary behaviors were the same as or distinct from those predicting intentions. Actual dietary behavior was proximally predicted by affective associations with the behavior. By contrast, behavioral intentions were predicted by cognitive beliefs about behaviors, with no contribution of affective associations. This dissociation has implications for understanding individual regulation of health behaviors and for behavior change interventions

From Finnish AEC knowledge ecosystem to business ecosystem: lessons learned from the national deployment of BIM

Government actors, public agencies, industry and academics have struggled to change the rules of the existing business ecosystem to support the networked practices that were envisioned back in the 1980s with the introduction of building information modelling (BIM). Despite the industry’s far-reaching technological capabilities, BIM has primarily assumed productivity improvement by individual firms, which has not lead to a systemic change in the Finnish architecture, engineering and construction (AEC) business ecosystem. A field study of the Finnish AEC industry has resulted in a critical understanding of why successful and intensive R&D at a national level and wide adoption of BIM technology in Finland has not led to the expected systemic evolution of its AEC business ecosystem. Additionally, a methodology based on inductive grounded theory and historical analysis has been used to capture and identify the evolving and dynamic relationships between various events and actors between 1965 and 2015, which, in turn, has aided in the identification and characterisation of the knowledge and innovation ecosystems. The research findings provide insights for BIM researchers and governments in terms of establishing new policies that will better align BIM adoption with the systemic evolution of business practices in the AEC business ecosystem

Prevention Is Political: Political Party Affiliation Predicts Perceived Risk and Prevention Behaviors for COVID-19

BACKGROUND: Many US politicians have provided mixed messages about the risks posed by SARS-CoV-2/COVID-19 and whether and to what extent prevention practices should be put in place to prevent transmission. This politicization of the virus and pandemic may affect individuals\u27 risk perceptions and willingness to take precautions. We examined how political party affiliation relates to risk perception for one\u27s own and other people\u27s likelihood of SARS-CoV-2 infection/COVID-19 illness. METHODS: We surveyed members of a nationally-representative, probability-sampling based survey panel (N = 410) to examine their risk perceptions, precautionary behaviors, and political party affiliation. RESULTS: The more strongly one identified as a Republican, the less risk one perceived to oneself from SARS-CoV-2/COVID-19 and the less risk one perceived other people faced. Moreover, those identifying as more strongly Republican engaged in fewer preventive behaviors. CONCLUSIONS: This differential response may affect virus transmission patterns and poses a considerable challenge for health communications efforts

Minor troponin T elevation and mortality in patients with atrial fibrillation presenting to the emergency department

Background There are limited data on the association of minor troponin elevation in unselected patients with atrial fibrillation (AF) presenting to the emergency department (ED) with adverse events. In this study, we sought to assess the early and mid-term mortality of these patients. Methods In this observational study, 2911 patients with AF were admitted to the ED. They were divided into 3 groups based on peak high-sensitivity troponin (TnT) levels: normal ( Results All-cause mortality was 6.7% (n = 196) at 30 days and 22.2% (n = 646) at 1 year. Mortality rate increased along with increasing levels of TnT irrespective of baseline covariates, primary discharge diagnosis and type of AF. A significant association between TnT levels and all-cause mortality was observed. The adjusted hazard ratio (HR) at 30 days was 6.02 (95% CI 2.62-13.83) for TnT 15-50 ng/L and 11.28 (95% CI 4.87-26.12) for TnT 51-100 ng/L (P Conclusions Among patients with AF admitted to the ED, increased TnT levels were associated with increased early and mid-term all-cause mortality irrespective of baseline covariates and type of AF.Peer reviewe