Transforming Learning Through Online Storytelling: : 'Making the News' Evaluation Report

This report presents the findings from an independent evaluation undertaken by the University of Hertfordshire of the ‘Making The News project’ as it functioned within the East of England Broadband Network region (E2BN). Making the News represents a set of simple tools that allow teachers and students to rapidly produce ‘news’ stories and publish them on line. It was developed by the Centre for New Media at the Open University in conjunction with E2BNFinal Published versio

Associations between physical activity in adolescence and health behaviours, well-being, family and social relations.

This is an Accepted Manuscript of an article published by Taylor & Francis Group in International Journal of Health Promotion and Education on 16 September 2014, available online at: https://doi.org/10.1080/14635240.2014.923287Across Europe and North America, few young people meet the recommended levels of physical activity (PA) of 1 hour of moderate to vigorous PA per day. However, the lives of young people cannot simply be polarised as either completely sedentary or active. Drawing on findings from the World Health Organization Health Behaviour in School-aged Children cross sectional international study, this paper examines the domains of adolescent life associated with young people's participation in overall PA, including health behaviours, social relationships and family activities. Consideration is also given to gender differences. Information in England was collected from 4404 students aged 11, 13 and 15 years, using anonymised self-completed questionnaires. Physical aspects of lifestyle were determined using internationally validated items for measuring PA that met international guidelines for activity and the frequency and duration of vigorous exercise undertaken during leisure activities. Separate analyses were conducted for boys and girls. Levels of PA and vigorous exercise were compared using the chi-squared test for trend. The findings draw attention to the value for the health and well-being of young people participating in some form of PA, even if they do not meet the recommended levels. Medium levels of PA appear to be associated with high levels of life satisfaction, self-rated health and an improved sense of body image. Significant health gains are likely to be made for adolescents in encouraging sedentary young people to undertake some form of PAPeer reviewedFinal Accepted Versio

HBSC England National Report: Health Behaviour in School-aged Children (HBSC) : World Health Organization Collaborative Cross National Study

Findings from the 2014 HBSC study for Englan

Do grandparents matter? : The impact of Grandparenting on the wellbeing of children

This timely and important report shows the immense value of grandparents in 21st century family life. It reveals a unique relationship that exists between the older generation and the youngest: a relationship of love and trust that enables the children to use their grandparents as confidantes and counsellors as well as playmates and cookery instructors. The report shows that children value the non-critical support, emotional advice and guidance that grandparents offer and enjoy the quality time their grandparents give them. It also found that the relationship has benefits for grandparents adding to their raison d’être and contributing to their health and longevity. The report also notes the change in the nature of family relationships in Britain throughout the 20th century, from the extended family to the nuclear family to the current variety of relationships, formal and informal, in which both the elderly and the young suffer neglect. With today’s increased incidence of divorce and family breakdown, grandparents can sometimes provide the only stable family relationship in a child’s life, and yet grandparents often lose contact with their grandchildren during or after a divorce or relationship breakup and have no legal rights through the Family Court to continue offering loving care and support to their grandchildren. The report concludes that there is need for much greater understanding of the role and function of grandparents in family life today.Final Published versio

Written evidence submitted by HBSC England study team, Centre for Research in Primary and Community Care (CRIPACC), University of Hertfordshire (BYC033)

The 2017 Youth Select Committee conducted an inquiry into body image, inviting submissions from individuals and organisations. The HBSC England study team from the Centre for Research in Primary and Community Care (CRIPACC), University of Hertfordshire submitted evidence based on analysis of data from the HBSC study.Final Published versio

Self-harm in Adolescence: Protective Health Assets in the Family, School and Community

© The Author(s) 2016 This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made. The final publication is available at Springer via http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s00038-016-0900-2Objectives and main purpose: The aim of this paper was to examine if the multiple environments of the adolescent including family, peers, school and neighbourhood might function as protective health assets against self-harming behaviour during adolescence. Methods: The present study utilised data collected from 1608 respondents aged 15 years as part of the HBSC England Study. Multilevel modelling was undertaken using the package MLwiN (version 2.33) to investigate the potential domains and dimensions of family life, school culture and environment, and neighbourhood factors that may operate as protective health assets. Results: The results indicated that while peer support did not appear to operate as a protective health asset in the context of self-harm, key dimensions of adolescent/ parent interaction and adolescent experience of the school culture and their neighbourhood were associated with reduced likelihood of self-harming behaviours during adolescence. Conclusions: The Findings highlight the significance of belonging and connectedness as important constituent elements of protective health assets for young people. Interventions that address the multiple environments of the young person, may offer an effective means to reduce the levels of self-harm.Peer reviewe

Prevalence and Social Inequality in Youth Loneliness in the UK.

Using data from the English arm of the Health Behaviour in School-aged Children (HBSC) study, we examined the prevalence of loneliness for school-aged adolescents and how it is linked to social inequalities. The HBSC study collects data from 11-, 13-, and 15-year-olds, and is repeated every four years, allowing the exploration of prevalence rates of loneliness pre COVID-19 pandemic for comparison. We also explored whether loneliness was associated with socio-economic status (SES) and linked to academic attainment and health complaints. The total sample was 14,077 from 156 schools in England. Findings revealed a stable prevalence rate of 8.2% for loneliness from 2006 to 2014. We also found, across all survey years, (1) those aged 15 years were significantly lonelier than younger peers, (2) those who reported lower SES were lonelier than their more well-off peers, and (3) higher loneliness was associated with being '"below average" academically and reporting more health complaints. Conclusions: These prevalence data enable researchers, policymakers, and others to make comparisons with prevalence rates during the COVID-19 pandemic to explore whether there have been increases in loneliness among school-aged adolescents. Loneliness was consistently related to social inequalities, suggesting that targeted interventions that include whole systems changes are needed

RESONANČNÍ METODY MĚŘENÍ VISKOELASTICITY BIOLOGICKÝCH STRUKTUR

RESONANCE METHODS OF MEASUREMENT VISCOELASTICITY OF BIOLOGICAL STRUCTURES. Dynamic loading is typical for most biological structures. Consequently, mechanical behavior of biological structures cannot be fully described by static parameters and characteristics. Changes in deformation lead to energy losses, furthermore, energy losses are result of existence of viscose constituents in mechanical behavior in biological materials. Bodies in which losses of energy are not negligible belong to category of so called viscoleastic bodies. Viscoelasticity is property of bodies or material that exhibits both viscous and elastic behavior when deformed. From the mathematical point of view, relationships between stresses and strains may be described by adequate differential equation. More practical approach is based on rheological models or, more recently, on determination of complex modules of elasticity, complex dynamic stiff ness and mechanical impedance. Availability of applicable methodology of measurement of viscoelasticity is essential for quantifi cation of mechanical behavior viscoelastic bodies. At present, methodology DMA (dynamic mechanical analysis) is applied for measurement of viscoelasticity industry. The DMA is based on measurement of mechanical frequency characteristics. Methods based on RMA (resonance mechanical analysis) are designated for measurements in biomechanical and biomedical laboratories