Inducing empathy towards upper limb impairments using a physical device and virtual reality

Abstract. Empathy is the ability to understand concepts deeply and intimately from the perspective of another person. Having this empathetic understanding of different medical conditions will help make more informed decisions when designing for a particular condition and increase the motivation for providing higher quality results. However, it can be quite challenging for people to easily gain this kind of empathetic knowledge without fully comprehending the extent to which a particular impairment affects someone’s day-to-day life. One of the most popular and effective methods of inducing empathy towards impairments is the use of empathy simulations. The basic concept of empathy simulations is to realistically simulate the limitations posed by an impairment so that the participant can gain a first-hand experience of what it is like to live with the impairment. Traditionally, these simulations were created using various physical means, but lately the use of virtual reality devices in these simulations has become more common. Virtual reality is essentially technology that allows the user to embody another persons perspective, which makes it exceptionally suitable for empathy simulations. The aim of our study was to investigate the generation of empathy towards upper extremity motor impairments using a mixture of physical and virtual means. For the purposes of this study, we built an arm mobility restricting harness to mimic an upper extremity motor impairment and a virtual reality environment of a home kitchen where the simulations took place. Two groups of volunteer participants experienced the simulation by performing simple tasks in the virtual reality environment while being limited by the mobility restricting harness. The difference between the groups was in having to recite different backstories for their simulated characters. Backstory for group 1 was in first-person, and group 2 for group in third-person. The stories were thought to target affective and cognitive empathy differently. The participants’ level of empathy was measured once before the simulation and once after the simulation using a collection of standardized questionnaires. The study showed significant increase in the level of emotional contagion over all participants (p < 0.044*) suggesting that the simulation increased the participants’ level of empathy in that category. No significant difference was measured between backstories, however, the results suggest the first-person story to assist cognitive empathy. The study also showed that the group with the backstory in first-person had better scores in all categories of embodiment suggesting that the first-person backstory enabled participants to better relate to their virtual character. Despite some promising results, further studies are needed to investigate empathy generation using a mixed physical and virtual empathy simulations

Guidance on Monitoring of Marine Litter in European Seas

This publication is a Reference Report by the Joint Research Centre of the European Commission.The MSFD Technical Subgroup on Marine Litter was tasked to deliver guidance so that European Member States could initiate programmes for monitoring of Descriptor 10 of the MSFD. The present document provides the recommendations and information needed to commence the monitoring required for marine litter, including methodological protocols and categories of items to be used for the assessment of litter on the Beach, Water Column, Seafloor and Biota, including a special section on Microparticles

Large-scale data integration framework provides a comprehensive view on glioblastoma multiforme

Background: Coordinated efforts to collect large-scale data sets provide a basis for systems level understanding of complex diseases. In order to translate these fragmented and heterogeneous data sets into knowledge and medical benefits, advanced computational methods for data analysis, integration and visualization are needed.Methods: We introduce a novel data integration framework, Anduril, for translating fragmented large-scale data into testable predictions. The Anduril framework allows rapid integration of heterogeneous data with state-of-the-art computational methods and existing knowledge in bio-databases. Anduril automatically generates thorough summary reports and a website that shows the most relevant features of each gene at a glance, allows sorting of data based on different parameters, and provides direct links to more detailed data on genes, transcripts or genomic regions. Anduril is open-source; all methods and documentation are freely available.Results: We have integrated multidimensional molecular and clinical data from 338 subjects having glioblastoma multiforme, one of the deadliest and most poorly understood cancers, using Anduril. The central objective of our approach is to identify genetic loci and genes that have significant survival effect. Our results suggest several novel genetic alterations linked to glioblastoma multiforme progression and, more specifically, reveal Moesin as a novel glioblastoma multiforme-associated gene that has a strong survival effect and whose depletion in vitro significantly inhibited cell proliferation. All analysis results are available as a comprehensive website.Conclusions: Our results demonstrate that integrated analysis and visualization of multidimensional and heterogeneous data by Anduril enables drawing conclusions on functional consequences of large-scale molecular data. Many of the identified genetic loci and genes having significant survival effect have not been reported earlier in the context of glioblastoma multiforme. Thus, in addition to generally applicable novel methodology, our results provide several glioblastoma multiforme candidate genes for further studies. Anduril is available at http://csbi.ltdk.helsinki.fi/anduril/ The glioblastoma multiforme analysis results are available at http://csbi.ltdk.helsinki.fi/anduril/tcga-gbm

Mental Symptoms and the Use of New Technical Equipment

The aim of this paper was to present how mental symptoms are connected to the use of desktop, portable or minicomputers (communicators and hand-held computers), mobile phones, and background information such as age and gender in the Finnish working-age population. The study was carried out as a cross-sectional study by posting a questionnaire to 15 000 working-age (18–65) Finns. The mental symptoms of 6 121 respondents were analysed using the model factors age, gender, the use of computers and the use of mobile phones. In all data, the use of desktop computers was related to mental symptoms. However, the results of our data are not highly reliable, because the nonresponse rate was over 50%. Nevertheless, it may be essential to take into account in the future that working with computers can increase workers’ mental symptoms, and it is important to observe their mental health