Increasing employment instability among young people? Labor market entries and early careers in Germany since the mid-1980s

´"In the light of rising economic uncertainty, employers increasingly try to transfer market risks to their employees and to establish more flexible employment relationships. Young people are supposed to be especially exposed to labor market flexibilization as the lack of seniority, work experience, lobby, and networks make it possible to shift precarious employment forms to them. In our paper, we investigate whether employment instabilities are indeed rising among young people in Germany and whether certain groups of young people are at a particularly high risk. Our analyses are based on data from the German Socio-Economic Panel (GSOEP) and refer to the period since the mid-1980s; they include young people from Eastern and Western Germany as well as migrants of three different educational cohorts. To capture employment instabilities among young people in Germany, we focus (1) on the duration of first job search, (2) on the risk of fixed-term employment in the first job, (3) on the risk of unemployment after having entered first employment, and (4) the re-entry chances of unemployed persons. Our analyses show that young people face increasing difficulties at labor market entry in recent years: it takes them a longer time to find a first job; a rising share of them is confronted with unemployment directly after leaving the educational system; and starting the employment career in a fixed-term contract is more frequent nowadays. We find growing employment turbulence also in the early career: unemployment risks have been rising for those who have already found a job. Flexible forms of employment (fixed-term positions) seem to be particularly at risk to end in unemployment. Furthermore, it has become more difficult to reenter employment after a phase of unemployment. Employment instabilities do not hit all employees alike, but especially the lowly educated and the lower occupational classes as well as East Germans and migrants. The results indicate that qualification and class became increasingly important for young people's labor market chances since the mid-1980s. We thus find a relative strengthening of inequality structures among young people in Germany in an era of increasing labor market problems." (author's abstract

Ethics education in pediatrics: Implementation and evaluation of an interactive online course for medical students

Introduction: The COVID-19 pandemic has catalyzed the development of online learning formats in virtually all areas of medical education. In pediatric ethics, online learning may not only substitute but also offer specific advantages over traditional classroom teaching. Many pediatricians rate their ethics education as poor and medical ethics education lacks evaluation, especially regarding the students’ needs. The aim of this project was to implement and evaluate a novel interactive distance learning approach to engage medical students in pediatric ethics education. Methods: An online ethics course was designed and delivered between May and June 2020. Core item of this course was a moderated, written forum discussion spanning several days. Evaluation was mixed methods. We evaluated the effectiveness of the course in terms of quality of the learning environment with a particular focus on relevance to students as well as interactive learning and reflective thinking. The Constructivist On-Line Learning Environment Survey (COLLES) was used to evaluate six different domains of the course. Data are presented as mean (standard deviation [SD]). The respective score range is 1-5, whereby a score of 4 or 5 means that the participants indicated the corresponding item as frequently or almost always present. Results: Responses were available from 104 (78.3%) of the 133 participating students. “Relevance” yielded a score of 4.17 (0.83), “reflective thinking” a score of 4.22 (0.83). “Interactivity” was scored 3.76 (0.99) and “tutor support” 4.72 (0.53). “Peer support” and “interpretation” scored 3.87 (0.98) and 4.49 (0.60), respectively. In qualitative analysis, students particularly valued the structure of the course, the relevance for their professional practice, their active participation and the incentive to reflective thinking. Students also indicated that this was an innovative and exciting format, which fills a current educational gap and should hence be continued beyond the pandemic. Conclusion: In conclusion, students actively engaged in online learning and perceived this ethics course as highly relevant for their professional practice

Использование информационно-коммуникационных источников для усовершенствования знаний старшекласников

This article examines the impact of the globalization process on individual life courses and employment careers in modern societies from an international comparative perspective. Empirical results are summarized from the GLOBALIFE research project (Life Courses in the Globalization Process), which studied the effects of globalization on life courses for the first time. As the results demonstrate, the globalization process has had diverse effects on different phases of the life course. Qualified men in their mid-careers are broadly protected from the effects of globalization, while young adults are the losers of the globalization process. We also find that educational and class characteristics determine the extent to which an individual faces increasing labour market risks. Under globalization, these effects have intensified. The results of the GLOBALIFE project thus indicate that globalization triggers a strengthening of existing social inequality structures. Another central finding is that globalization has not led to the same outcome across various modern societies. Globalization appears to be distinctly filtered by deeply embedded national institutions. These institutional packages entail diverse strategies of labour market flexibilization which themselves differentially shape patterns of social inequality in modern societies

Meperidine and skin surface warming additively reduce the shivering threshold: a volunteer study

INTRODUCTION: Mild therapeutic hypothermia has been shown to improve outcome for patients after cardiac arrest and may be beneficial for ischaemic stroke and myocardial ischaemia patients. However, in the awake patient, even a small decrease of core temperature provokes vigorous autonomic reactions-vasoconstriction and shivering-which both inhibit efficient core cooling. Meperidine and skin warming each linearly lower vasoconstriction and shivering thresholds. We tested whether a combination of skin warming and a medium dose of meperidine additively would reduce the shivering threshold to below 34 degrees C without producing significant sedation or respiratory depression. METHODS: Eight healthy volunteers participated on four study days: (1) control, (2) skin warming (with forced air and warming mattress), (3) meperidine (target plasma level: 0.9 mug/ml), and (4) skin warming plus meperidine (target plasma level: 0.9 mug/ml). Volunteers were cooled with 4 degrees C cold Ringer lactate infused over a central venous catheter (rate asymptotically equal to 2.4 degrees C/hour core temperature drop). Shivering threshold was identified by an increase of oxygen consumption (+20% of baseline). Sedation was assessed with the Observer's Assessment of Alertness/Sedation scale. RESULTS: Control shivering threshold was 35.5 degrees C +/- 0.2 degrees C. Skin warming reduced the shivering threshold to 34.9 degrees C +/- 0.5 degrees C (p = 0.01). Meperidine reduced the shivering threshold to 34.2 degrees C +/- 0.3 degrees C (p < 0.01). The combination of meperidine and skin warming reduced the shivering threshold to 33.8 degrees C +/- 0.2 degrees C (p < 0.01). There were no synergistic or antagonistic effects of meperidine and skin warming (p = 0.59). Only very mild sedation occurred on meperidine days. CONCLUSION: A combination of meperidine and skin surface warming reduced the shivering threshold to 33.8 degrees C +/- 0.2 degrees C via an additive interaction and produced only very mild sedation and no respiratory toxicity

Flexibility processes and social inequalities at labor market entry and in the early career: a conceptual paper for the flexCAREER project

"Continuous full-time work is becoming less frequent in modern societies. Instead, flexible forms of employment such as part-time work, fixed-term contracts, and self-employment as well as phases of unemployment are gaining importance. These trends are supposed to be more pronounced at labor market entry, leading to a longer entry process and increasing difficulties in becoming established in the labor market. However, there are vast differences between countries with regard to forms of labor market flexibility and the degree of uncertainty faced by young people. This working paper provides a theoretical framework for the empirical studies within the flexCAREER research program. The aim of flexCAREER is to study the consequences of employment flexibility strategies on labor market entries and early careers as well as their impact on structures of social inequality in a cross-country perspective. We explain the reasons behind the rise in employment flexibility and develop hypotheses with special regard to nation-based institutional differences. In particular, we describe what role institutions such as the education system, employment relations, and welfare regimes play in determining the consequences of employment flexibility strategies. We focus on the institutional contexts of Great Britain, the USA, Germany (East and West), the Netherlands, Italy, Spain, Denmark, Sweden, Estonia, and Hungary; these are the countries under study within the project. The hypotheses in this working paper concern the following aspects: 1. the phase of labor market entry in terms of a) the duration of search for the first job and b) the quality of this first job (with regard to the flexibility of the employment contract and the 'adequacy' of the job with respect to the employee's educational qualification). 2. In view of the early career we outline our expectations in terms of a) the risk of unemployment, b) the chances of re-entering the labor force when unemployed (e.g., with regard to the duration of unemployment until finding a new job), c) upward and downward mobility, d) the chances of leaving precarious work at the beginning of the career, and e) the risk of making a transition into a precarious form of employment." (author's abstract

Extracellular MRP8/14 is a regulator of β2 integrin-dependent neutrophil slow rolling and adhesion

Myeloid-related proteins (MRPs) 8 and 14 are cytosolic proteins secreted from myeloid cells as proinflammatory mediators. Currently, the functional role of circulating extracellular MRP8/14 is unclear. Our present study identifies extracellular MRP8/14 as an autocrine player in the leukocyte adhesion cascade. We show that E-selectin-PSGL-1 interaction during neutrophil rolling triggers Mrp8/14 secretion. Released MRP8/14 in turn activates a TLR4-mediated, Rap1-GTPase-dependent pathway of rapid beta 2 integrin activation in neutrophils. This extracellular activation loop reduces leukocyte rolling velocity and stimulates adhesion. Thus, we identify Mrp8/14 and TLR4 as important modulators of the leukocyte recruitment cascade during inflammation in vivo

Extracellular MRP8/14 is a regulator of β2 integrin-dependent neutrophil slow rolling and adhesion

Myeloid-related proteins (MRPs) 8 and 14 are cytosolic proteins secreted from myeloid cells as proinflammatory mediators. Currently, the functional role of circulating extracellular MRP8/14 is unclear. Our present study identifies extracellular MRP8/14 as an autocrine player in the leukocyte adhesion cascade. We show that E-selectin-PSGL-1 interaction during neutrophil rolling triggers Mrp8/14 secretion. Released MRP8/14 in turn activates a TLR4-mediated, Rap1-GTPase-dependent pathway of rapid beta 2 integrin activation in neutrophils. This extracellular activation loop reduces leukocyte rolling velocity and stimulates adhesion. Thus, we identify Mrp8/14 and TLR4 as important modulators of the leukocyte recruitment cascade during inflammation in vivo